


U^ 






1°*. 



o_ * 





r -.^". 










5^^on 








V^' 



^:r>*i- 











^' 








:. '•^t^.o^ oV-^^DP^'- ^^^-^ 





''v %.** ,-i«^% %„./ /Jfe\ **,.«*'.•• 















• M" A^ ♦ (CCv «» A '^n ^ * i 



■SvT, 



.v^^ 



■^v/^, 






,**\.-J^-.\ C,°*.^^.>o ,/.C^.\ 0°* 






•' /% •.^•° ^■^'"'^* WC^-' /'X •-■^K*' **"' 











_ . . --.:•' /% ''•^,' **'% -^yn^-- v^^' ■ 










o . . ' G^ '^ *'T7r» /% 




-J^^ 
^"^ .^ 






ELEAZER WHEELOCK RIP 



i 



-OF — 



The War OF 1812. 



Major Genera] in the United States Armr 
Member of Congress — Btc. 



HIS NEPHEW. NICHOLAS BAYLIES 
DES MOINES, IOWA. 



DES MOINES, IOWA. 

BREWSTER & CO., PKINTEES AND PUBLISHERS. 

1890. 



E55 



In h. 



PREFACE. 

In writing the life of General Ripley and for 
a more just understanding of his character, the 
author has taken the libert}^ to go into the details 
of history, the delineation of contemporaries, 
the results of the measures which engaged his at- 
tention, and the efforts he made to shape public 
opinion in regard to them. 

To such results we properlj^ look in judging 
of the patriotism, the sagacit}^ and courage of 
Public Men and in deciding what amount of 
praise or censure, they merit whether in militar}^ 
or civil life. 

The people of the United States, prior to 1815, 
were divided into two political parties, known as 
federal and republican. General Ripley, in early 
life, joined the latter and as conducive to a better 
understanding of the aims and principles which 
controlled him, and the respective parties, we 
give in an appendix, a concise histor}^ of the ex- 
citing cpiestions which, growing out of the action 
of the general government, agitated New Eng- 
land during that period. 



CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER I. 

Page. 
Barlr ^nd Military Life of Eleazer Whee- 

}ock Ripley:— 1782-1815 1 

CHAPTER IL 
Military and Political:— 1815-1820 79 

CHAPTER III. 
Civil and Political:— 1820-1836 101 

CHAPTER IV. 
Political-Retirenient-Death— 1836-1839. . . . 138 

APPENDIX. 

Politics in New Encrland:— 1789-1815 151 



v=> 



Parties-United states Bank-Alien and Se- 
dition Laivs-Enibargo-War of 1812 and 
the Hartford Convention. 



FE OF ELEAZER WHEELOCK RlPLEY. 



CHAPTER I. 
Life of Eleazer IV. Riplej-, 1 782-1815. 

Eleazer W. Ripley, conspicuous among the 
heroes of the war of 1812, with Great Britain, a 
prominent and influential member of the great 
political party to which Jefferson, Madison, Jack- 
son, Edward Livingston, George Bancroft and 
Levi Woodbury belonged, and ever a devoted 
friend of the National Union, was born at Hanover 
in the state of New Hampshire, April 15th, seven- 
teen hundred and eighty-two. 

His father, Sylvanus Ripley, was a member of 
the first class which was graduated at Dartmouth 
College. Subsequently" became professor of the- 
ology in that institution, and while occupying that 
position was accidental!}" killed February 5th, sev- 
enteen hundred and eighty-seven, b}" being thrown 
from a sleigh, on his way to a neighboring town to 
fill an appointment. He left a widow and three 
sons and three daughters, to lament his early and 
untimely decease. 

From information furnished by Mitchell's His- 
tory of Bridgewater, Massachusetts, it is probable 
that Professor Ripley was the grand-son of the 
William Ripley who served in Gallup's company", 
in the unsuccessful expedition against Quebec, in 



2 Life of Eleazer Wheclock Ripley. 

1G90. Jonathan Ripley, the father of the Profes- 
sor, was born March 5th, 1707, and died August 
lOth, 1772, and the Professor himself was born 
September 29th, 1749. On his mother's side, Gen- 
eral Ripley was grand-son of Eleazer Wheelock, 
D. D., the founder of Moor's Charit}- vSchool, for 
the education of Indian youths, and subsequently 
of Dartmouth College. 

Doctor Wheelock was the great grand-son of 
Ralph Wheelock, who was born in Shropshire, 
England, about A. D. 1600, and after having been 
educated at Clare Hall, Cambridge, and become a 
non-conforming minister, emigrated with man}- 
others to America, in 1G37, in the pursuit of re- 
ligious liberty. He settled in Dedham, Massachu- 
setts, and became proprietor of Medfield, where 
many of his descendants resided. Not having 
charge of a church, he is said to have employed 
himself in the instruction of youth and in giving 
such "wise counsel as was needed in civil and ec- 
clesiastical matters" at that early period.* His son 
Eleazer, was both a christian and a soldier. In a 
war Avith the Indians he commanded a corps of 
Cavalry, occiipied his own house for a garrison, 
and with great spirit and gallantry expelled the 
savages from his settlement. Upon the return of 
peace, he conciliated them by good offices and of- 
ten joined thein in the chase. His son Ralph, im- 
distinguised by any civil or military prominence, 
acquired and sustained the character of a hospita- 

*I,ondon Christian Observer, January, 1814. 



His Family — In Colonial Days, ^ 

ble and pious fanner. He was twice married. 
His first wife was Ruth Huntington with whom 
he was united in marriage January 8th, 1707. The 
children by tliis marriage were Eleazer, the only 
son, named after his paternal grand-father, and five 
daughters. His second wife was Merc}^ vStandish, 
a descendant of Miles Standish, who figured so 
largel^^ in the early settlement of Rhode Island. 
Some writers, probably not aware of the two mar- 
riages, have represented that Dr. Wheelock, and 
through him General Ripley, were lineal descend- 
ants of the famous Colonial soldier. 

The son Eleazer, was born in Dedham, Connec- 
ticut, April, 1711. Receiving a handsome legacy 
from his grand-father, after whom he was named, 
he was enabled to enter Yale College, where he took 
his American degree in 1733, and where he was the 
first to receive the interest of a legacy given by 
Dean Berkley, to the best classical scholar. After 
graduation he entered the ministry and in 1735 be- 
came pastor of the North vSociety, in Lebanon, 
Connecticut. Describing his character as a 
preacher, his co-temporary, Dr. Trumbull, says: 
"His preaching and addresses were close and 
pungent and yet winning beyond almost all com- 
parison, so that his audience would be melted into 
tears before they were aware of it." "The intoler- 
ance which drove his great grand-father from 
vShropshire, gave character and tenacity to his love 
of freedom. His love and zeal for Christ and his 
cause gave him pilgrim self-denial and power. 



4 Life of Eleazer Wlwelock Ripley, 

His first great worlv as an itinerant preacher, 
raised him to the high position of j^oke-fellow of 
Whitefield in the Great Awakening, and shadowed 
forth his great good-will to man, however and 
wherever his Lord and Master might call him.* 
Soon after this he became interested in the educa- 
tion of youth, and formed the plan of an Indian 
missionary school. As early as 1743, he received, 
among the boj's whom he was educating, as his 
first Indian pupil, Samson Occuni, wdio subse- 
quenth" became a distinguished preacher, not only 
in this country but also in Great Britain, which he 
visited in 1766 at the instance of Mr. Wheelock. 
While abroad he was extremel}^ successful in se- 
curing funds for the promotion of the beneficent 
objects of the school, which as earl 3' as 1762 had 
more than twenty pupils, chiefl}^ Indians. About 
1754, Joshua Moor, having donated a house and 
two acres of land in Lebanon-, contiguous to Mr. 
Wheelock's house, the institxition was named 
Moor's Charity vSchool. 

Occuni, aided by the Rev. Nathaniel Whitaker, 
who accompanied him, succeeded in raising b}^ con- 
tributions about £7000, in England, and between 
£2,000 and £3,000 in Scotland, to be expended un- 
der the supervision of a board of trustees, of 
which Lord Dartmouth was president, and of the 
Scotch Society for proj^agating christian knowl- 
edge. After operating the school some fifteen 
3^ears, Dr. Wheelock determined to seek a more 

^Crosby's Century of Dartmouth College. 



His Faniilv, 5 

desirable location for tJie institution, and to obtain 
for it an incorporation as an academy- at which 
white and Indian youths could receive a res-ular 
and thorough education. At that time, Harvard 
and Yale Colleges and Brown University, in its in- 
fancy, were the only colleges in New England. 
He finall}^ selected Hanover, New Hampshire, as 
the site of the proposed institution, and obtained 
a charter for Dartmouth College, which was partlj- 
endowed by Governor John Wentworth. The 
school and the college were, however, kept distinct 
although Dr.Wheelock was president of both. The 
college was named after the Barl of Dartmouth, 
who was a benefactor of the school, but not of the 
college "to the establishment of which he and the 
other trustees were opposed as being a departure 
from the original plan." In 1770 President Whee- 
lock removed to the new location which at that 
period was an arduous and toilsome undertakinp*. 
Of this, says one writer "Dr. Wheelock, in 1770, 
with his family, servants, laborers and scholars, 
seventy in all, with cattle and carts, implements 
of husbandry, books and household effects, etc., 
traveled slowly and wearily one hundred and fifty 
miles over rough roads, to their destined wilder- 
ness home." As to the condition of travel then 
in New England, in comparison with the present, 
that distinguished scholar, Professor George Tick- 
nor, of Harvard College, gives this grai3hic ac- 
count in his auto-biography: "M3- grand-father's 
farm was at Lebanon on the Connecticut river. 
Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, 



6 Life of Eleazer IVheelock Ripley, 

where my father was educated, was only a few 
miles off, and he liked to visit both. M}'^ mother 
went with him, and so did I, beginning in 1802. 
But it was a very different thing to travel then and 
in the interior of New England, from what it is 
now. The distance was hardly one hundred and 
twent}^ miles, but it was a hard week's work with 
a carriage and a pair of horses. The carriage be- 
ing what used to be called a coachee. One da}^ I 
recollect, we made with difficulty thirteen miles, 
and the road was so rough and dangerous that ni}^ 
mother was put on horseback, and two men were 
hired to go on foot with ropes to stead}" the car- 
riage over the most difficult places. But we got 
through at last, and I enjoyed it very much, for it 
was all new and full of strange adventure. I was 
eleven when I took this, my first jovirne}"." The 
winter of 1771 proved cold, the snow lay from four 
to five feet deep and provisions were procured 
with difficult}" for the support of the manj" per- 
sons at Hanover. 

The duties that devolved upon the pres- 
ident were various, but he applied himself 
with untiring zeal to their performance. Receiv- 
ing no salary but only a support, he served as 
President of the college and preceptor of the 
school, supervised the erection of the necessary" 
buildings, the location of roads, the clearing of 
land, and the building of bridges and of mills. 
With him it was a labor of love and of a broad, 
comprehensive sense of dut}". As to the extent of 
his labors we may form an idea from the follow- 



Founding of Dartmouth College. 7 

ing description, which he gave of them at the ex- 
piration of those years: "For six months" sa^^s 
he, "in the year, I have thirty to forty laborers, be- 
sides men in the mills, kitchen, wash-house, etc., 
the last year about eight}^ students, dependent and 
independent, besides my family, consequently 
large. I have seven 3-oke of oxen, twent}^ cows; 
have cleared and fenced fifteen acres of wheat, 
and have twenty acres of corn; have cleared pas- 
turing, sowed hay-seed, and girdled all the growth 
on five hundred acres. I have enclosed with a 
fence about two tliousand acres of this wilderness 
to restrain my cattle and horses. A little more 
than three years ago there was nothing but a hor- 
rible wilderness, now eleven comfortable dwelling 
houses, beside the students' house, barns, malt 
and brew house, shoj^s, etc. I live in ni}- little 
store house, my family is much straightened but 
cannot afford to build for m3^self."* 

President Wheelock was unceasing in his ef- 
forts to advance the interests of the institution, 
but the difficulties which soon arose between the 
mother country and the Colonies, followed by open 
war, interfered with the prosecution of his plans, 
cut off his resources, and he found himself con- 
fronted by pecuniary embarrassments. 

In April, 1775, intelligence reached Massachu- 
setts that the complaints of the American Colon- 
ists met with an unfavorable reception in Eng- 
land, that both houses of parliament had pledged 

*Dr. Crosb3^ 



8 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

to their king their most zealous and hearty co-op- 
eration for the reduction of the colonies, and that 
the army of General Gage, in Boston, would be 
speedily and largely re-enforced. At the same 
time British emissaries were industrious among 
the Indians of the Northwest in stirring up and 
enlisting them with all their ferocious and merci- 
less passions in the service of the British king. 
The people of New England were especially ex- 
posed to their fury, and the frontier settlement at 
Hanover would naturally be the first to suffer from 
one of their warlike and predatory incursions. 
Alarmed at the dangers which menaced the settle- 
ment and the college, which had so long been the 
object of his care and nurture. President Whee- 
lock dispatched "James Dean, a young preacher, 
who understood the language of the Iricpiois, to 
itinerate among the Indians in Canada and bright- 
en the chain of friendship." * 

The dreaded attack was happily averted, and 
to the long devotion of the president in his efforts 
to ameliorate the condition of the Indians,may pos- 
sibly be attributed, in a large degree, the escape, 
at this critical period, from the horrors of savage 
warfare. 

The deep anxiety which filled his mind may be 
inferred from what he says in a letter written in 
1775: "I have sent to Connecticut upon the 
almost hopeless eri-and to hire t'600 and 
propose to mortgage my patrimony and all 

^Bancroft, Vol. iv, pp 309-10. 



His Family — The Revolutionary War. 9 

my interest there, as security for three or four 
^years rather than send these boys away. He did 
not live to see the close of the struggle, but expir- 
ed on the 24th of April, 1779, with his intellect un- 
impaired to the last." Says his biographer: "For 
the several duties of president of the school and 
college, professor of divinity and pastor of the 
church in the college, Dr. Wheelock received no 
other compensation than a suppl}^ of provisions 
for his family; and having advanced between three 
and four thousand dollars out of his owai funds 
for the use of the institution at the season of its 
chief difficulties, he, by his last Avill, bequeathed 
to it this sum, reserving only an annuity of about 
one hundred and sixty dollars to his eldest son, an 
invalid." "The charter of the college gave him 
the right to apj^oint his successor who should con- 
tinue in office until disapproved b}" the trustees,* 
and he selected his second son, Colonel John 
Wheelock, then in the continental army and who 
served luider General Gates at the capture of 
Burg03me. Upon the cessation of hostilities. Col. 
Wheelock made a successful visit to Europe in 
the interest of the institution and held the posi- 
tion of president for some thirty years.*!" After 

*Trusteesof Dartmouth College vs. Woodward, 4 Wheaton, 
U. S. Rep. p. 518, V. 5. 

■\' Wheelock, John, D. D, L. L. D , ij 54.-18 ij. 

B. Conn, studied 3 years at Yale College. Went with his 
father to Hanover 1770 and graduated at Dartmouth College 
1771; was tutor 1772-1774; represented Hanover in the legista- 



to Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

the clo&e of the war, the college entered again up- 
on a prosperoiis career; handsome donations flow-^ 
ed in to its assistance, from different sources es- 
pecially from the states of Vermont and New 
Hampshire, and the many illustrious men, who 
have received its benefits, bear undisputed and 
ample testimony to its usefulness. 

Among these, General Ripley occupied a 
prominent position. 

Born soon after the decease of his maternal 
grand-father, after whom he was named, deprived 
of paternal instruction, the supervision of his 
early education devolved upon a mother, who, 
a woman of culture and energy, applied herself 
with a mother's solicitude to the education and 
support of her j^oung and dependent children. 
In a place but just reclaimed from its primeval 
forests and solitude, and reminded on every hand 
by the example of others, of what man owes to 
man, it was natural that youth should be inspired 
with eager and ambitious hopes. Under such 
influences the young Ripley entered the College 
in the fourteenth year of his age and throughout 
his college course sustained such rank as gave 
promise of future usefulness. 

ture 1773; serv^ed for a time in continental army, became lieut. , 
colonel and major; was on Gates' staff; elected president on the 
death of his father 1779; visited England 1780 to obtain funds; 
was shipwrecked off Cape Cod and lost his money and papers; 
was removed in 18 15 on account of an ecclesiastical controversy, 
but restored in two years. He published sketches of Dartmouth 
College. — American Addition to Chambers Encyclopedia. 



Barly Life—1 782-1812. 11 

Upon his graduation in the j^ear eighteen 
hundred he commenced the study of law in the 
office of his cousin, Judge Woodward, at Hanover, 
and afterwards prosecuted it in tlie office of his 
brother-in-law, the Hon, Judali Dana., of Frjeburg. 
JMaine. 

Amid the high party spirit which pervaded 
the country, Blackstone and Coke could not exclu- 
sively occupy his mind, and he soon became 
Avarmly and prominently enlisted in the political 
contest which was then fiercelj^ agitating the com- 
munity. He espoused the side of what was then 
called the republican and subsequently the demo- 
cratic party and advocated its principles with a 
zeal and efficiency that drew upon himself the 
notice and displeasure of some prominent and in- 
fluential political opponents. 

The hostility caused b3^ his political attitude 
proved an obstacle to his admission to the bar, but 
this was finally overcome, although a feeling of 
deep exasperation toward the judges, who passed 
upon his application for admission, long remain- 
ed in his bosom, and, perhaps, was never full3^ 
removed. 

At this period of his life, party feeling in 
New England ran high and at this remote period 
it is difficult to realize the extent and bitterness 
which party animosity attained. 

After his admission to the bar, he located in 
Maine, then a province of Massachusetts, where 
he was soon engaged in an extensive and success- 



f2 Life of Eleazer Wlwelock Ripley, 

fill practice of his profession. At the same time 
his mind \va^ not indifferent to political matter© 
in which he took an active part and in 1807 he wa& 
returned by the town of Winslow, as a member 
of the legislature of Massachusetts, in which he 
exerted himself with great success to effect an ad- 
justment of the conflicting land titles by which 
the section of the state, represented by himself, 
was greatly distiirbed. A member of subequent 
-sessions, he was elected in ISll to fill the vSpeak- 
er's Chair in the House of Representatives, vacat- 
ed by the appointiiient of the Hon. Joseph vStory 
as one of the judges of the vSupreme Court of the 
United States. He presided with distinguished 
ability, but having removed to Portland, he was 
not a member of the House for the following ses- 
sion but was returned in 1812 to the vState vSenate 
for the district composed of the counties of Cum- 
berland and Oxford, the latter count}- being then 
the residence of his brother, James W. Ripley, 
and of his brother-in-law, Judali Dana, both active 
and influential democrats and who doubtless had 
an important agency in elevating him to the sen- 
ate. At this period he boldly avowed himself in 
favor of a war with England. His senatorial du- 
ties were soon terminated b}- his accepting the 
appointment of lieutenant colonel in the United 
vStates army, conferred upon him b}^ President 
Madison. 

Entering upon his military duties, he was en- 
trusted with a sub-district extending from vSaco to 
the eastern frontier of what now constitutes the 



Barly Life— Professional and Political. 1^3 

state of Mame. He applied himseli assiduoiisl3^ 
to placing his district in a posture of defence, to 
superintending the recruiting service, and to a 
severe course of military study. 

Between the 18tli of June, 1812, and vSepteni- 
ber, his recruits were embodied into a regiment, 
called the twenty-first, of which he had the com- 
mand and which he marched to Plattsburg, near 
the nortJiern frontier. Upon the close of the in- 
efficient operations of the campaign, his regiment 
was ordered into winter quarters at Burlington^ 
Vermont, where, during the ensuing winter, he 
devoted himself to its discipline and by his un- 
wearied efforts enabled it to become subsequently 
the model regiment of the army. 

At this juncture, party spirit had attained an 
alarming pitch and it is not improbable that there 
were some who would not have regretted the dis- 
grace of the American arms, if, thereby their 
own political aspirations were gratified. They 
denoiuiced the war, derided its causes, and inter- 
posed obstacles to its successful prosecution. 
They were aided in their opposition by many who 
would doubtless have been eager to repel the in- 
vader of our own soil, but, viewing the war as im= 
politic and unnecessary, were not disposed to en- 
courage the invasion and conquest of Canada and 
were desirous of expelling the supporters of the 
war from power, for the purpose of filling their 
places with men who would, as they thought, more 
readily avail themselves of the first opportunity 
to re-establish peace. 



14 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley, 

In the excitement of political and even reli- 
gious strife and controversy, how liable is the 
mind to be carried to extremes, which are re- 
membered with regret when the moment of ex- 
citement is passed. 

Highl}^ embellished descriptions of the dis- 
astrous character of republican policy were in 
many instances too successful in dispelling the 
influence of a proper sense of the national honor 
and of the national rights. 

To such an extraordinary pitch did hostility 
to the war arise that the Senate of the Legislature 
of Massachusetts, upon the capture of the British 
ship. Peacock, by Captain Lawrence, declared it 
''unbecoming a moral and religious people to ex- 
press approbation of naval and military exploits 
which were not immediately connected with the 
defence of their coast and soil, "and the corporation 
of the city of Hartford, Connecticut, passed an or- 
dinance excluding all troops of the United States 
from the city, while the state legislature was en- 
deavoring to discourage and prevent the enlist- 
ment of soldiers. 

From the position which he had occupied as 
an advocate of the war, and as a member of the 
Massachusetts legislature, General Ripley was ful- 
ly apprised of the opinions of the people in that 
quarter of the Union, and of the great responsibil- 
ity that rested upon those who were determined 
to sustain the policy of the government. With 
the natural energy of his character, he endeavor- 



Milltarx Life. 15 

ed to dispel tlie fears of the timid, to defeat the 
intrigues and machinations of opponents, to 
strengthen the government and to promote the 
glory of his country. His political feelings and 
his love of fame were alike combined to stimulate 
him in his efforts to avert a disastrous issue to the 
war. Hence his industry the first winter to pre^ 
pare himself and his regiment for active service 
was unceasing, and the ensuing spring found 
them ready for an active and brilliant career. 

Promoted to the rank of Colonel upon break'* 
ing up his winter quarters, he marched to Sack- 
etts Harbor, where his regiment was attached to 
the brigade of General Pike, to whom was en» 
trusted the immediate command of the meditated 
attack upon York,* the capital of Upper Canada. 

On the 23 of April the troops embafked upon 
this expedition and executed its object with great 
gallantr3^ On the morning of the 27th, a landing 
was effected, despite a severe cannonade opened 
upon the shipping; the enemy abandoned their 
forts and the assailants rushed forward to seize 
them. At this moment the magazine of the ene- 
my exploded, annihilating the advance columns 
and mortally wounding the gallant Pike. Amid 
the consequent confusion, the enemy were noticed 
calling in their detached parties and concentrating 
their force in the town. This however w^as aban- 
doned at the approach of the American troops, and 
left to capitulate upon such terms as the enemy 

*Now Toronto. 



16 Life of EleRzer Wheelock Ripley, 

should be pleased to grant. During its occupan- 
C}' by the American arni}-, the tweutj^-first regi- 
ment was stationed to protect the propert}^ of the 
citizens, and performed this duty to the very 
great satisfaction of the inhabitants of the town. 

The army being re-embarked, proceeded to 
the assault of Fort George. Their arrival before 
this fort was delayed by adverse winds until the 
8th of Ma}^ and they were not ready for the assault 
until the 27th of the month. Dis-embarking un- 
der a well directed fire of their shipping, the line 
of the enemy was soon broken and put to flight, 
and the British commander, to save the garrison, 
abandoned the fort and commenced a hasty re- 
treat. The 21st regiment having been formed in 
reserve, but slightly participated in this action^ 
and on the 3rd of June, diminished by the enem}-^ 
and sickness, it was ordered to Sacketts Harbor 
to recruit. 

Here General Riple}^ had a severe attack of 
sickness, caused by exposure and hardship, but 
by the middle of July he was able to resume the 
active duties of the camp. 

The next three months he was incessantly oc- 
cupied in disciplining the new recruits annexed 
to his regiment, which, when the army made a 
rendezvous at Sacketts Harbor, in the middle of 
October, was found in an excellent condition for 
service. 

The military operations of 1812, and the 
spring of 1813, under General Dearborn, had so 



Military Life— 1812-1815. 17 

greatly disappointed public expectation, that the 
president was induced to remove him and he took 
leave of the army on the 15th of July 1813, pur- 
suant to instructions of the vSecretary of War to 
retire until his health should be re-established. 
Brigadier General Boj^d and other officers remon- 
strated against his departure, but he answered 
them by referring to the command of his supe- 
riors. General Wilkinson succeeded him, but did 
not arrive until August to assume command. 

It was determined to carry out the project of 
the Secretary of War, of combining the armies of 
Wilkinson and of Hampton in a joint undertaking 
for the capture of Montreal and Quebec. But un- 
fortunately there was no good feeling between 
these two commanders. Hampton had no inclina- 
tion to co-operate and avoided doing so. 

Wilkinson on the 21st of October embarked 
at Grenadier Island in more than three hundred 
boats, protected by ' some vessels furnished by 
Commander Chauncey, and started upon his ex- 
pedition, but while his army was descending the 
vSt. Lawrence, which he did not reach until the 5th 
of November, he was prostrated b}^ illness. 

Hampton put in no appearance and the enemj' 
was active in impeding their progress. There 
was no pitched battle or effective blow, but on 
the 7th, 8tli and 9th of November, while the army 
moved down the vSt. Lawrence as if still expect- 
ing to meet Hampton, troops were often landed 
to repel hostile movements and on the IClh the 



18 Life of Eleazer IVheelock Ripley, 

troopvS commanded by General Bo3'd, and includ- 
ing Covington's brigade, to which Riple^^'s regi- 
ment belonged, were so closely press^ed at Chryst- 
ler's field, near Williamsburg, as to be compelled 
to join battle. At the close, both sides claimed 
the victor}'. 

The British historian Christie, pronounces 
this action the "handsomest engagement during 
the war" from the professional science displayed 
by the commanders. 

The battle was hotly contested for about two 
hours, when, according to General Boyd's official 
report, the enemy, having been driven from the 
field, did not venture to renew the attack the next 
day, but permitted the ami}' to pursue its way un- 
molested. Gen. Covington was mortally wound- 
ed, while the American loss was 100 killed and 
236 wounded. The British claimed a less loss on 
their side, but this is doubtful. During the en- 
gagement, the 21st regiment, after the fall of Gen. 
Covington, was interposed as a line for the protec- 
tion of the artillery, maintained its position with 
unshaken courage and obstinanc}^, and largely 
contributed to avert defeat. 

The troops imder Boyd were sixteen hundred, 
and prisoners represented the English force at 
two thousand one hundred and seventy. When 
Covington fell, the command of his brigade fell 
upon Col. Pearce and in the report of the battle, 
vSwartw^out, Gaines, Ripley, Morgan, Grafton, Wal- 
lack, Beebee, Chambers, Johnson, Cummings, 



Military Life— 1812-1815, 19 

Worth and Whiting are mentioned with distinc- 
tion. 

On the 12th of November, Wilkinson received 
a letter from Gen. Hampton refusing to co-oper- 
ate with his division or to proceed further into 
Canada, and thereupon with the unanimous ad- 
vice of a Council of War, Gen. Wilkinson aban- 
doned the expedition and had his ami}'- removed 
to Frencli Mills, on vSalmon River. 

And thus a campaign planned upon a large 
scale, from which great results were anticipated, 
came to an inglorious close. The cause which 
contributed largely to this result was the absence 
of harmony among those who should have merged 
private feelings in co-patriotic determination 
to make success the paramount object, and which 
is thus indicated by Ingersol in his history of the 
War: "On the 5th of September, 1813, he (Arm- 
strong) arrived at Sacketts Harbor, whence he 
wrote in familiar terms to Gen. Wilkinson, that 
Gen. Hampton would go through the campaign 
cordially and vigorously, but resign at the end of 
it; be ready to move by the 20th with an effective 
force of 4,000 men and militia detachment of 
1,500. On the supposition that Provost had taken 
post and chosen his champ cle hattaile, I had, 
adds Armstrong, ordered Hampton to the Isle 
Aux Noix. Wilkinson's jealousy of Armstrong's 
authority was as sensitive as Hampton's of Wil- 
kinson's. On the 24th of August, Wilkinson wrote 
to Armstrong: I trust you will not interfere with 



20 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley, 

my arrangnients, or give orders within the dis- 
trict of nw command, but to m3^self, because it 
would impair nw authority and distract the pub- 
lic service. Two heads on the same shoulders 
make a monster. Unhappily for the country, that 
deplorable campaign was a monster with three 
heads, biting and barking at each other, with a 
madness which destroA'ed them all and diso-raced 
the country'. Discord was a leprosy" in the very 
marrow of the enterprise, worse than all its other 
calamities. Armstrong was on good terms with 
both Wilkinson and Hampton till it failed, but 
thenceforth the enmit}' became as bitter between 
him and both of them, as between the two them- 
selves."— To/ 1, p. 295. 

The campaign, however, had tested the brav- 
er}' of individual corps and their officers. 

The British force at this period, in the two 
Canadas, was probably inadequate, if vigorously 
and skillfull}' assailed, for the defense of the im- 
mense line of frontier with a sparce population, 
extending from Quebec to the upper lakes and 
against which, at any point, an overwhelming force 
could be readily concentrated. Unfortunateh' the 
Secretary of War was deficient in the energy and 
promptitude of action suited to the crisis, and 
while absorbed in drawing up plans of campaigns 
and embodying the military precepts of Napoleon 
and Frederick the Great, in prolific epistles to the 
commanding officers he was either destitute of 
that capacity of discriminating character, which 



Mintarv Life— 1812-1815. 21 

would enable him to select a proper commander 
in chief, or from partiality could overlook the 
grossest military mis-conduct and palliate and 
excuse the most bhindering operations. The 
American force, instead of being combined and 
striking a decisive blow, was stationed in detached 
bodies unable, from- their remoteness, to sup- 
port each other in the event of an attack, and 
passing the season in idleness, or in engagements 
unproductive of any signal results. 

If the inefficienc}' of the campaign arose from 
the incapacity of the generals or a spirit of rival- 
ship, which impelled them to seek individual re- 
nown regardless of the interests of the countr}-, 
they should have been promptly removed and the 
Secretary of War shovild thereby have given an 
example of his own militar}^ genius that would 
prove that he had studied the precepts of distin- 
guished soldiers to some purpose. Whatever 
may have caused the inefficiency of the campaign 
its conduct was severelj^ criticized and created 
general dissatisfaction. Armstrong, Secretary of 
War, felt the necessity of a bold and fortunate 
movement to arrest the public censure, and for 
this purpose, determined upon a winter campaign 
which was subsequently abandoned in conse- 
cpience, as he says, of the "blunders of Mc Clure, 
the crimes of Leonard and the disobedience of 
Wilkinson."* 

After his army was placed in winter quarters, 

^Armstrong's notices of the war of 1812. Vol, 2. p. 64. 



22 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Riplej^, 

Willviiisou left liis caiiip oii accomit of indisposi- 
tion, and the command devolved npon the Senior 
Brigadier General, Jacob Brown, of New. York, 
who was. destined to x>lay a conspicuons part in 
subseqnent millitar^^ 0|>erations. Having distin- 
gnished himself as a Brigadier General of state 
militia ii\ repelling a British attack npon Sacketts 
Harbor, Ma^^ 29th, 1813, he was soon after honored 
b}' a commission of the same grade in the United 
States ami}' and served with ability and distinc- 
tion in Wilkinson's unfortunate expedition. On 
the 24th of January, 1814, he was promoted to the 
rank of Major-General and placed in command 
of the militar}^ district previously commanded by 
Wilkinson. 

In the latter part of Februar}^ such informa- 
tion of the position of the English force in Canada 
was received at Washington, that it was resolved 
to commence active operations immediately, and 
to capture Kingston, with the public stores of the 
enemy, which were deposited there, before the 
British Army should be re-inforced, which was 
not expected until June. Orders were consequent- 
ly issued to Gen. Brown and simultaneously an 
order, intended to fall into the hands of the enemy 
and to deceive them, was issued directing the cap- 
ture of Fort Niagara.* 

The result of these orders is thus described 
by the Secretary of War. "Unfortunately circum- 
stances had alread}^ occured to prevent a compli- 

*Armstrong's notices of the war of 1812. Vol. 2, p. 64. 



Militnrx Li£e--r812-lSlB, '2S 

ance with this order. In the opiwion of the mili- 
tary as well as the iiaval coiMiiaander at Sacketts 
Harbor, the force assigned to the service (four 
thousand lueii) was incompetents, and that had 
this been otherwise, the doubtful condition of the 
ice on the lake, would of itself be sufficient to for- 
bid the exi3erin]ent. This oj)inion being decisive 
with the President, no new or additional order 
was ^iven, when (to the surprise of all having au}^ 
acquaintance w^ith the subject) it was found 
that the two commanders, by some extraordinary 
mental process, had arrived at tlie same conclu- 
sion — that the niahi action (an attack on Kings- 
ton) being impracticable, the r^zse (intended mere^ 
ly to mask it) might be substituted for it — -a belief 
under which a column of two thousand mex\ was 
actuall}^ put in motion for the Niagara." 

In March, 1814, a concentration of troops took 
place at Buffalo, New York, and went into a camp 
of instruction, of which Gen. Scott draws the fol- 
lowing picture: "Major General Brown, appoint- 
ed to command the entire frontier of Ne\v York, 
had marched some da^^s earlier from the French 
Mills for the same destination with the 9th, 11th, 
21st, 22d, 23d and 25th regiments of infantry (not^ 
one of them half full), several field batteries and 
a troop of light dragoons. Scott joined him some 
miles east of Buffalo, March 24th, 1814. Brigadier 
General Ripley, Scott's junior, was with these 
troops. The major general, though full of zeal 
and vigor, was not a technical soldier, that is, 
knew but little of organization, tactics, police, etc. 



24 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley, 

He, therefore.charged Scott with the establishment 
of a camp of instruction at Buffalo, and the prep- 
aration of the army for the field by the opening 
of the season. 

The spring, in the region of Bnffalo, is, till 
late in Ma}^, inclement, and March qnite wintry- 
No time, however, was lost; the camp was formed 
on very eligible ground; the infantry was thrown 
into first and second brigades. The latter under 
Ripley, and the service of out-posts, night patrols, 
guards, and sentinels, organized a systein of sani- 
tary police including kitchens, etc., laid down 
rules of civilit}', etiquette, courtesy — the indispen- 
sable outworks of subordination prescribed and 
enforced, and the tactical instruction of each arm 
commenced. Nothing but night or a heavy fall of 
snow or rain was allowed to interrvipt these exer- 
cises on the ground — to the extent, in tolerable 
weather, of ten hours a da}^ for three months." 
After such thorough militar}^ instruction these 
troops were well prepared for an active summer 
campaign, and in July and subsequent to the time 
when the enemy dail}^ expected re-inforcements 
from Europe, Gen. Brown was instructed to cross 
the river, "capture Fort Erie, march on Chippewa, 
risk a combat, menace Fort George, and if assured 
of the ascendency and co-operation of the fleet, to 
seize and fortif3^ Burlington Heights," etc. 

Having been promoted in the preceding April 
to the rank of Brigadier General he (Ripley) took 
leave of his regiment in a brief and handsome 



Military Life— 1812-1815, 25 

address to which a committee of the officers made 
a reply accompanied by the presentation of a 
sword as a testimonial of their respect and es- 
teem.* Being assigned to the command of the 
second brigade which embraced the 21st regi- 
ment, and subsequently a company of the 17th, 
another of the 19th, and a battalion of the 23d, reg- 
iments, he was detached with the first brigade un- 
der General Scott to execute the meditated inva- 
sion of Canada. Although averse to the move- 
ment, neither the ascendency or co-operation of 
the fleet being assured, he performed the duties 
assigned hiin with signal ability and courage. 

The country, which was to become the object 
of immediate attack and the scene for the displa}^ 
of American bravery, is thus described by an 
American historian: 

"The romatic peninsula between those inland 
seas, lakes Ontario and Erie, and the river Niagara, 
whose waters unite the two lakes, was the theatre 
in the summer of 1814, of an isolated and sanguin- 
ary campaign, as striking as the rvigged fea- 
tures of that wild region. The river running about 
thirty-six miles from one lake to the other, consti- 
tutes the national boundary between rival empires 
of the same lineage, language, hardy and adven- 
turous spirit, exaggerated to greater boldness in 
America by the vaster territories inhabited, 
waters navigated, and liberty enjoyed. Fort 
George in the corner between Ontario lake and the 

*Niles Reg. June 4, 1814. 



26 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley . 

river Niagara on the British side, stands opposite 
to Fort Niagara on the American, since December 
1813, and throughout the war forcibly" held by 
the English, much to the disgrace of America, and 
in spite of all that public sentiment could do to 
goad public force to retake it. At the other end 
of the peninsula, the British Fort Erie stands op- 
posite to Buffalo, where the river Niagara flows 
into lake Erie. Black Rock, Williamsburg, Man- 
chester, are villages on the New York side; New- 
ark and Chippewa on the Canadian, their Queens- 
town right opposite to our Lewistown. Midway 
between the two lakes the river Chippewa, coming 
from among the six nations and other tribes of the 
West empties into the river Niagara near the falls, 
opposite to the American town of Manchester. 
There the Niagara, about three quarters of a mile 
wide, after tumbling over rapids for near a mile, 
plunges down 170 feet of the most stupendous 
cataract of the world, one of the prodigious linea- 
ments of the North /American Continent."* 

On the morning of the 3d of Jul}-, 1814, the 
two brigades left camp, and crossing the strait 
from Buffalo, invested Fort Erie which sur- 
rendered after slight resistance. Its garrison con- 
sisted of 130 men under the command of Major 
Buck, of the 8th infantry, while a large British 
force was at the same time entrenched at Chippewa, 
only a few miles distantunder Major General Riall. 
Brown moved toward Chippewa the next day. 

*Ingersol, vol. 2. p, 85. 



Military Life— 1812-1815, 27 

Scott's brigade was in the advance, constantl}" an- 
noyed b}^ the eneni}', and when it reached the 
plain, about two miles wide between vSreet's Creek 
and the Chippewa, the eneni}" made a vigorous 
attack which was gallantly repelled hj Captain 
Crocker of the 9th regiment. Finding the enem3^ 
strongl}^ posted, General Scott withdrew his bri- 
gade behind Street's Creek, where he encamped, 
and where he was joined about midnight by Gen. 
Brown and the 2d Brigade and artiller3^ and the 
next forenoon General Porter arrived with about 
three hundred volunteers and some three or four 
hundred Indians. 

Earlj^ on the morning of the fifth, the Ameri- 
can pickets were assaidted b}" those of the British 
and to repel these, after having refreshed his troops, 
Porter was directed to proceed through the wood 
which skirted the plain on his left, and after driv- 
ing in the enemy's picket to fall back so as to 
entice the Brittsh to follow within reach of our 
main bod}^ Gen. Porter proceeded to execute 
this order with great gallantr}'^, when he was sud- 
denly confronted by the advance of the whole Bri- 
ish arm3^, 1700 men; unable to make a stand against 
this overwhelming force he fell back. Riall had 
left his entrenchments, and crossing the Chippewa 
with his left resting on the Niagara river, advanc- 
ed read}^ for battle. The continual firing between 
Porters force and the enem3^'s together with the 
clond of dust that rose in the distance, apprised 
Brown of the enem3^'s purpose, and he took 



28 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

prompt measures to meet him. When this pur- 
pose was discovered, Scott, whose brigade was 
just forming under arms for exercise, was order- 
ed to cross the bridge over Street's creek and 
meet the enemy. Towson's battery rendered im- 
portant aid to this movement by being promptly 
placed in position in the plain near the bridge 
over vStreet's creek, and, by his well directed and 
animated fire, anno^ang the enemy's line. About 
five o'clock in the afternoon the engagement be- 
came general, and both sides fought with desper- 
ate courage and a fixed determination to conquer, 
the British infantry being supported by a battery 
of twenty pounders and howitzers, and the Amer- 
ican by a batter}^ with guns of inferior caliber 
and numbers. The brunt of the battle was main- 
tained with equal obstinancy by Scott's brigade, 
Towson's artiller}^ and by Porter's vokmteers, 
who, recovering from their first onset, returned 
with gallantry to the combat. When the battle 
had raged for about an hour, a movement of Scott 
accompanied by an opportune discharge of Tow- 
son's battery spread consternation and dismay 
through the British ranks, and after a fearful loss 
on both sides, Uie enemy hastily retreated across 
the Chij^pewa to the protection of their entrench- 
ments. The British loss in killed and wounded 
was placed hy the British Annual Register at 
one-third of the Englishinen engaged.* 

The second brigade under Riple^^in the mean- 

*Ingersol, vol. i, p. 91. 



Militnr}- Li£e~mi2-1815. 29 

time, had advanced with the view of getting in 
the rear of the enemy's right flank, and Peterson, 
in his history of tlie wars of the United States, 
and in the biography of Brown, says: "While the 
brigade of Scott had been achieving the victory, 
that of Ripley had not been inactive. Brown had 
no sooner left Scott than he plaed himself at the 
head of these battalions and advanced with them 
on the left, behind the woods, hoping to gain the 
rear of the enemy's right flank. But the almost in- 
stantaneous success of Scott, the foe was in full re- 
treat before this could be effected: The whole of 
the American army, now uniting, however, advanc- 
ed with loud cheers, the bands playing in triumph. 
It is said to have been a magnificent spectacle." 

After the enemy had secured the shelter of 
their entrenchments and not considering himself 
in a condition to make an immedate attack, Gen. 
Brown marched his army back to the position 
which they occupied in the morning. On the 8th 
he resumed operations, when the British General 
became alarmed, abandoned his entrenchments, 
and throwing a part of his force into Fort George, 
retreated twelve miles further up the lake to 
Twenty Mile Creek where he decided to make a 
stand. 

After following him to Queenstown and find- 
ing that he had retreated from that place, Brown 
abandoned the pursuit and determined to march 
against and capture Fort George. After a delay 
of several days, the march was commenced, but 



30 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

on arriving in the vicinitj^ of the Fort, ascertain- 
ing its capabilit}' of defense, and that no co-opera- 
tion could be expected from Chauncey's fleet in a 
movement against Kingston, Brown commenced, 
on the 22d, a retrograde march to the Chippewa. 

On the 13th Brown had written Chavmce^^ in 
command of the fleet on lake Ontario: *'For God's 
sake, let me see you. All accounts agree that the 
force of the enemy at Kingston is very light. I 
do not doubt m^^ ability to meet them in the field 
and march in an}" direction over their country, 
3"0ur fleet carrying for me the necessary 
supplies. We can threaten Forts George aad 
Niagara, carry BurlingtoiN.Heights and York 
and proceed direct' to Kingston and carr}'^ that 
place. We have between us sufficient means to 
conquer upper Canada in two months, if there is 
prompt and zealous co-operation, before the 
eneni}" can be greath^ re-infored. 

Perhaps not considering his ascendenc}" in 
the Lake secured, and not indulging in Brown's 
sanguine expectation. Commodore Chauncey de- 
clined the service desired of him, replying that 
while the nav}- "might be somewhat of a conven- 
ience" he confessed, in the transportation of pro- 
visions and stores for the arm}", j-et the vSecretary 
of the Nav3" had given him the higher destiny 
to seek and fight the enemy's fleet." 

As Brown's army after having fought with 
brilliant success, one of the most sanguinary and 
most hotl}" contested battles that had ever occurred 



Military Life^lS 12-18 15. SI 

upon this Continent known indiscriminately in his- 
toYj as the battle of Liindy's Lane, Niagara or 
Bridg:ewater, was within four weeks after the in- 
vasion of Canada, confined within the walJs of 
Fort Erie by a greatly superior force, and onl}- 
saved from capture by Herculean efforts and un- 
daunted bravery during a siege of fifty days, it is 
evident that Brown greatlj^ under estimated the 
strength and resources of the enemy. . Rel3dng 
however upon the accuracy of his information, im- 
patient to sustain and advance the interests of his 
country, anxious to justify the expectation of his 
countrymen, that his invasion of Canada had been 
wisely planned and bravel^'^ and successfull}^ ex- 
ecuted, he was profoundly disappointed and 
chagrined at the condition of affairs, when an im- 
mediate forward movement became impracticable. 

vSays Ingersol: "On the twenty-second of Jul3% 
when Brown relinquished the last hope of prompt 
naval co-operation, his predicament became pre- 
carious. But resolved not to abandon the enter- 
prise begun, he came to the heroic, if not desperate, 
determination to disincumber his army of baggage 
and push forvvard to Burlington Heights at all 
events. To mask the movement, and also re- 
plenish his provisions from stores at vSchlosser, 
the army was led back to Chippewa on the 24th 
of July, whose classic grounds and j^roud recollec- 
tions soon elicited the memorable achievements 
of one of the most obstinate and sanguinarj^, alto- 
gether extraordinar}^ battles b}^ night." 



32 Life ofEIeazer Wheelock Ripley. 

Brown, however, was not alone in the belief 
of the feasibility of a march to the Heights, for in 
extracts from his diary, published in Ingersol's 
History, in 1849, he says: The army fell back to 
the Chippewa on the 24th. General Scott, ever 
ambitions to distinguish himself and his com- 
mand, was solicitous to be allowed to march 
for Burlington Heights with the first brigade; and 
expressed his wish to this effect, on the morning 
of the 27th. On the morning of the 25th, he made 
the request in fcrm, and was so tenacious on the 
subject, that he appeared quite vexed that the 
Commanding General would not divide his forces. 
Scott honestly belived, that with the troops he 
asked, he would cover himself with additional 
glory and add to the fame of the army." 

Brown on his arrival at Chippewa was whollj^ 
unapprised that Riall had closely followed him 
and that reinforcements were being rapidly 
hastened up to him b}^ Gen. Drummond, his supe- 
rior officer, who arrived on the ground after the 
commencement of the battle the next day. The 
British intended to attack at day-break on the 
morning of the 26th, and on the morning of the 
25th they alread}^ largely outumbered the Ameri- 
cans. Brown Avas resting in the utmost security 
with not the remotest idea of an impending bat- 
tle, and w4ien this commenced more than three 
hundred of his troops where detailed for washing 
and other camp service and did not participate in 
the engagement of the 25th. About noon of this 
day Gen. Brown was startled into action b}- infor- 



Military Life— 1812-1815. 33 

mation of the arrival of General Drumniond at 
Queenstown with reinforcements and of an expe- 
dition toward vSchlossor, the dej^ot of American 
supplies. 

This information it would seem from the 
following- extract from vScott's autobiography was 
unfounded, for he says: "It turned out,not only not 
a man had been thrown over the river, but that the 
night before Lieutenant General vSir George 
Drummond had arrived by the lake with a heav3^ 
reinforcement, and had pushed forward his bat- 
talion (sixteen miles) as they successively land- 
ed. One was ahead, in line of battle and the others 
were coming up by forced marches. 

The aches in broken bones feelingly remind 
the autobiographer of the scene he is describing, 
and after the lapse of nearly fifty years he cannot 
suppress his indignation at the blundering stupid 
report made by the militia colonel to his confiding 
friend. Major General Brown." 

Major Leavenworth, chief officer of the daj^, 
had reported, early in the morning of the 25th, that, 
with a glass, he had seen a trooj) of horse and two 
companies of infantry, believed to be the British 
advance about two miles distant, near Wilson's 
Tavern, in the vicinit}^ of the Falls of Niagara. Still 
thinking that no attack upon himself was intended 
but on l}'^ a movement on the other side of the river 
against his supplies and without sending out an}^ 
re-connoitering party to ascertain what the demon- 
stration reported in the morning, by the officer of 



34 Life of Eleazer IVheelock Ripley. 

the d^y, meant, he decided to make a demonstra- 
tion that would induce the enemy to abondon hi^ 
supposed advance upon Schlosser. For this pur- 
pose, General Scott was ordered to march toward 
Queenstowni with the first brigade, Towson's com- 
pany of artillery, Harris' troop and some volunteer 
cavalry in all a small force probablj^ not far from 
800 men. After an advance of about three miles, 
Scott unexpectedly found himself in the presence 
of the British army in greatly superior force and 
occupying a strong and admirably selected position. 
When ordered to move, General Brown saj^s, "Scott 
was particularly instructed to repart the appear- 
ance of the enemy, and to call for assistance if that 
were necesary. Having the command of the dra- 
goons, he would have, it was considered,the means 
of collecting and communicating intelligence. 

On General Scott's arrival near the Falls, he 
learned that the enemy's forces were directly in 
his front, a narrow piece of wood alone intercepting 
his view of them. Waiting only to dispatch this 
information, but not to receive any communication 
in return, the general advanced upon them." 

During the day the British army had been re- 
enforced by eight hundred men under General 
Drummond and after the engagement commenced 
twelve hundred more arrived under Colonel Scott.. 
Undeterred b}^ the display of forces or ignorant of 
it, General Scott immediatly detached Colonel Jes- 
sup with the 25th regiment to cover his right and 
pushing through the narrow strip of wood, which 



Militnry Life— 1812-1815. 35 

concealed the enemy from his view, with the 9th, 
11th and 22d reg-iments,these soon became exposed 
to an annihilating- fire from a battery, which was 
placed upon an eminence, suj^ported by infantry,se- 
evire from any material annoj^ance from the Ameri- 
can artillery. The battle rag-ed fiercely,the English 
battery was making terrible inroads upon his 
troops, but wScott with his 2nd brigade mantained 
the tmequal conflict with unshrinking courage un- 
til the arrival of other troops upon the field, when 
the battery was carried, the enemy driven from 
their position and after the most sanguinary and 
hardest fought battle of the war the American 
army was victorious. 

The conspicious part performed by General 
Ripley in the battle of Lundy's Lane was fully 
brought out by the testimony before the Court of 
Inquirj^ subsequently instituted at his own request. 
This court convened at Troy, New York, in March 
1815, and had proceeded only in part through the 
testimony of one witness, when the Court was dis- 
solved b}^ an order which expressed the mcst 
flattering opinion of his military conduct. 

The following is the testimony referred to 
and the order dissolving the court: 

"William McDonald, Captain in the 19th 
Regiment of U. vS. Infantry, being produced and 
swcrn as a witness of Gen. Riplej^ — testified: That 
in the campaign of 1814, before and during the 
battle of Bridgewater near Niagara, he was acting 
aid to Brigadier General Ripley. On the morning 
of the 25th of Jul}^ the army under the command 



36 Life of f^leazer Wheelock Ripley. 

of Major General Brown, was encamped on the 
upper side of Chippewa Creek, niam^ of the men 
were that day engaged in washing and about half 
an hour before sunset were still out when a firing 
was heard, which the}" in camp, ascribed to Gen. 
Scott's being engaged with the enem3% as he had 
marched out with his brigade about two hours be- 
fore. 

When Gen. vScott first marched out, it was the 
general impression that he had done so for the 
purpose of parade and drill; our army at this time 
consisted of two brigades of regular troops, com- 
manded by Brigadier Generals Scott and Ripley, 
and a small corps of 500 or 600 volunteers under 
General Porter. The total of General Riple^^'s 
brigade may have amounted to about 900: the 
effectives from 700 to 800. The da^^ before at 
Queenstown Heights, he recollected hearing Gen. 
Scott say that liis brigade contained about the 
same number, perhaps rather less. 

About the 16th of July, they had intelligence 
that Gen. Riall of the British army, lay at ten and 
twelve mile creek, with 1,500 men; according to 
the general impression, he had a fortified encamp- 
ment; to the best of his knowledge, no precise 
information was received of the force and position 
of the eneni}^ between the 16th and 25th of July. 
On the day hivSt mentioned, the proportion of those 
who formed the w^ashing parties and scattered 
men of the camp amounted in the second brigade 
alone to 150 or 200 men; there were parties from 
the other, but he could not state the number. 

When Gen. vScott moved out in the afternoon, 
no idea was entertained that there would be an 
action, nor had they any knowledge of the vicinity 
of the enemy; the first information the3'^ had was 



Military Life— 1812-1815. 37 

from the firing. In the order of the encanipnient 
the first brigade under Gen. Scott rested on the 
Chippewa; the second commanded by General 
Ripley, about 200 3^ards, distant, with their front 
to the Niagara, and at right angles to the first; the 
encampment embraced the angle formed b}^ the 
Niagara and Chippewa, which at that place form- 
ed a junction. 

Across the Chippewa was a bridge on which 
General vScott had passed and advanced two niiles» 
when thefirino; of musketrv commenced; immedi- 
atel}^ on hearing it, General Ripley ordered his 
brigade to be formed; by the time this was effected, 
the report of artillery was distinguished ; soon after 
orders were received from Major General Brown, 
throusrh some of his staff, for the second brigfade to 
advance and reinforce General Scott. Gen. Rip- 
ley, immediately on receiving the order, marched 
with his brigade across the Chippewa, and when 
about half a mile in the rear of the scene of action, 
it being then near dusk, dispatched the witness in 
advance to Major General Brown to ascertain the 
situation of the enemy, and what point he should 
march to and form his brigade. 

The witness, on his way to General Brown, met 
his aid, Capt. vSpencer proceeding with orders ta 
General Rii3ley, to form his brigade in the skirts of 
a wood on the right of Gan. vScott's. The brigade 
accordingly continued to advance, and was in the 
act of forming the line, when Gen. Ripley remark- 
ed to Col. Miller and other commanders that, to 
form a line in that place would be of no conse- 
quence, as they could not advance in line through 
the woods, and tliej^ were not then in striking dis- 
tance of the enemj" — he added, that he would take 
upon himself the responsibilit}" of moving farther 
on towards the enemy, before lie formed; the wit- 



38 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

ness left the brigade for a few minutes to apprise 
Gen. Brown of this niovenieut, but did not find 
him, and immediately rejoined Gen. Kipley. 

The march from the encampment to the scene 
of action was prompt and rapid, and the brigade 
for one half ot the distance was on a long trot to 
keep with the General's horse — while passing the 
woods in pursuance of Gen. Riple3^'s determina- 
tion to advance, the fire of the eneni}^ was very 
heavy, and their shot and shells fell about us in 
great quantities, but was more particularly direct- 
ed at Gen. Scott's brigade on the left, while the 
second was in the act of passing; the impression 
was, that the first brigade was at this time suffer- 
ing ver}" severely from the continued and destruc- 
tive fire poured in upon them, and Gen. Ripley in 
consequence remarked to the witness and Col. 
Miller, that he would detach the 21st Regiment, 
commanded by the latter to carry the enemy's 
artillery, adding that unless this was done, they 
would destroy our whole force, or compel us to 
fall back; it w^as then completely dark, and though 
it was known their artillery was posted on an em- 
inence, we had no knowledge of their number or 
how they were supported. The distance of Gen. 
vScott's line from the enemy, must have been be- 
tween three and four hundred 3"ards at that time, 
and there was then no firing of musketry from it. 
After Gen. Ripley's suggestion to Col. Miller, the 
latter immediately made dispositions to execute 
it — displayed his regiment by forming a line on 
the left of the road nearly fronting the enemj^'s 
artillery; Gen. Ripley, at the same time he gave 
the order for the 21st to storm the battery by an 
attack in front, directed the 23d to form in column 
and march against the enemy's flank; about the 
time the 21st was preparing to move as directed, 



Military U£e-~18 12-18 15, 39 

.the witness met Gen. Brown, who enquired for 
Gen. Ripley, and asked what dispositions he had 
made; the witness informed him; he approved of 
it, appeared quite elated witJi the iutellig-ence and 
accompanied him to Gen. Riple.y; some conversa- 
tion took place between them, and in a very few 
minutes both battalions w^ere in motion; the 21st 
commanded l\y Col. Miller, the 23d by Major Mc- 
Farland, but led by Gen. Riple3^ in person. While 
the 23d w^as advancing to operate ag-ainst the 
enemy's flank, and about 150 3^ards distance from 
the height, thcA^ received a fire in front from per- 
haps fifty or 'siKty musketr^^ w^hich threw them 
into confusion for a few minutes, and caused them 
to fall back about fifty or sixt^^ yards; the regi- 
ment however speedily recovered and formed in- 
to column, sooner tlian he has ever known one 
formed for parade — though perhaps not with 
equal accuracy. Some difficulty occured in form- 
ing the platoons, in consequence of their having 
been broken, but their numbers were guessed at, 
and wheeled into column with a view" to dispatch 
and facilitate the movement; the whole was ac- 
complished under the particular direction and 
immediate agenc3^ of Brigadier General Riple^^; 
his exertions to effect it w^ere very great, and no 
one could be more active than he was. The whole 
interval from the moment the fire was received in 
front, until the actual re-organization of the col- 
umn in readiness to advance, did not exceed five 
minutes; they then marched directly and deplojxd 
upon the enemj^'s flank. 

While this was performing Col. Miller ad- 
vanced pursuant to his orders against the front, 
and succeeded in carr3ang the enem3^'s batter3^, 
consisting of seven j^ieces of artiller3% to wit, two 
brass twenty-fours and smaller ones; having pass- 



40 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

ed the position where the artillery had been plant- 
ed, Col. Miller again formed his line facing the 
enemy, and engaged with them within twenty 
jjaces distance; there appeared a perfect sheet of 
hre between the two lines; while the 21st was in 
this sitnation, the 23d attacked the enemy's tlank 
and advanced within twent}^ paces of it before the 
first volley was discharged; a measure adopted by 
command of Gen. Kipley, that the fire might be 
effectual and more completely destructive; the 
movement compelled the enemy's flank to fall 
back immediately by descending the hill out of 
sight, upon which the firing ceased. Prior to the 
firing of the 23d, the enemy were closing in ujoon 
Col. Miller's command, which appeared to be hard 
pressed, and as he conceived was recoiling; the 
force opposed amounted to double his number; 
but by the prompt aid of the 23d, the heights 
were gained and cleared of the enemy. After this 
was achieved the 21st and 23d formed in line by 
order and under direction of Gen. Ripley, leaving 
the batteries which had been carried in the rear; 
while thus circumstanced, a detacment of the 1st 
Regiment, which consisted of from 100 to 200 men, 
and had remained in the rear, joined them on the 
heights, and was b}^ Gen. Ripley formed into the 
line. He could not say what had detained the 
above detachment so long from the scene of ac- 
tion. 

vShortley after the line was formed. General 
Riplc}" sent him to ask Gen. Brown whether the 
captured artillery should not be moved off the field 
toward Chippewa. The witness met Gen. Brown 
ascending the hill, and delivered his message. 
The latter replied there were matters of more 
importance to attend to at that moment, and he 
would see Gen. Ripley. He appeared highly elat- 



Military Life— 1812-1815. 41 

ed and rode with Gen. Ripley, but the witness did 
not hear the conversation which passed. The 
heights thus gained was a very commanding posi- 
tion, and contained all the enemy's artillery, capa- 
ble of enfilading in every direction. While the 
second brigade thus occupied the heights, General 
Scott's brigade was about three hundred yards dis- 
tant and no enemy between them. The firing 
from it had by this time nearly ceased. 

After General Brown's interview wdth General 
Ripley, he left the hill, as the witness understood, 
in search of Gen. vScott. The 25th regiment then 
joined the second brigade, was formed on the right 
nearly at right angles to the 23d regiment, its left 
resting on Towson's artiller}^ and disposed so as 
to flank the enemy in case they attacked. 

The artillery under command of Major Hind- 
man and Captain Towson had come up but a few 
moments before, in consequence of General Rip- 
ley's request communicated by the witness to Ma- 
jor Hindman and complied with by him. 

While Gen. Ripley's line was thus formed on 
the eminence, the enemy advanced upon it in con- 
siderable force — outflanking its right and left, and 
far exceeded it in numbers. On hnding Ihem ap- 
proaching, Gen. Riple}^ ordered the brigade to re- 
serve its fire until the enemy's should touch in pre- 
ference to firing first. This was done with a view 
to observe the flash of their muskets, and to take 
aim by the assistance of their light. The order 
was obeyed; the enemy advanced within ten or 
twelve yards of our right, composed of the 23d 
regiment. After receiving their fire, we returned 
it; the action then became general, a tremendous 
conflict ensued for about twenty minutes; at the 
expiration of which the enemy gave way, and again 
fell back out of sight. We having much the ad- 



42 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

vantage of the ground, the enemy generally" fired 
over our heads, but the continual blaze of light 
was such as to enable us distinctly to vsee their but- 
tons. An interval of half an hour followed when 
the enemy advanced a second time, nearly in the 
same manner, attacked precisely in the same point 
but did not approach so near, before the firing com-, 
mence. Our left had by this time been thrown 
forward by order of Gen. Ripley, and the line 
formed nearly parallel with the addition of 
General Porter's volunteers on the left and Gen. 
Scott with the three remaining battalions on the 
right, but the latter were so situated as not to be 
engaged. The contest was more severe, and he 
thinks longer continued than the last. The same 
precautions were enjoined by Gen. Ripley, with 
respect to his men reserving their fire, and the re- 
ception of the enemy was equally warm. Some 
part of our right and left gave way; but our centre 
composed of the 21st regiment, stood firm, with 
the exception of some platoons, which also fell 
back; the enemy were repulsed, and retired again 
from the contest. Gen. Ripley, in person, rallied 
the detachmenfs which gave way on the right and 
succeeded in bringing them back into action 
before the retreat of the enemy. An interval, not 
to exceed three quarters of an hour, ensued, 
during which all was darkness and silence, scarce 
interrupted by a breath of air. The men had 
neither water nor whiskey to refresh themselves, 
after the fatigues they had endured. 

The Court adjourned to Wednesday, March 15, 
1815, 11 o'clock, a.m. 

Troy, March 15, 1815. 

The court commenced pursuant to adjourn- 
ment — the same members present. 

The examination of Captain McDonald being 



Military Life— 1812-1815. 43 

resumed — he stated, that at the expiration of the 
interval last mentioned, the enemy advanced a 
third time to recover their artillery. It was our 
impression that they had been reinforced, and this 
was confirmed by prisoners who were taken at the 
time. The advance of the enemy was similar to 
the two preceding ones, and the fire was again 
opened by their line. Gen. Ripley's brigade re- 
served their fire as before. The duration and 
order of the conflict — its result and retreat of the 
enemy, were in all essential points similar to the 
last. 

In every attack the enemy were repelled. 
Gen. Ripley made every possibe exertion to in- 
spire and encourage his troops; exj^osed his per- 
son during the hottest, of the fire of the enemy; 
and as he considered more than was necessary. 
The witness several times endeavored to prevail 
upon him to retire, but without effect. His per- 
severence was tmremitted. vSometiines acting as 
file closer as well as commander. He gave his 
orders with perfect coolness and deliberation, and 
attended as far as possible to its proper execution. 
The witness never knew .him inore collected. 
Gen. Ripley's position was never more than ten or 
twelve paces in the rear of his line. He received 
two balls in his hat, and his horse was wounded 
during the several encounters. He, Lieu. Col. 
Nicholas, and the witness, were the only mounted 
officers of the brigade. 

After the last attack, the second brigade for 
three-fourths, or one-half an hour, reinained on 
the hill with very little change of position, its left 
was perhaps thrown back. In the interim. Gen. 
Ripley dispatched the witness with orders to Gen. 
Porter to send fifty or one hundred volunteers un- 
der his coinmand, directing them to report to Col. 



44 Life of Eleazer IVheelock Ripley. 

McRae, and remove the captured artillery from 
the heights to the camp on the Chippewa. He 
delivered the orders, saw the volunteers detached 
and marched on the hill. Owing to there being 
no drag ropes for the artillery, no horses on the 
ground, and the guns being unlimbered, it was 
found impracticable to remove them, and the vol- 
unteers were then employed in removing the 
wounded. Prior to the attempt to remove the 
captured pieces, he saw no artillery corps on the 
ground,they having retired in consequence of their 
ammunition being expended and some of their 
caissons blown up by the enemy's rockets and 
shells. 

On the return of the witness, after commu- 
nicating the preceding order to Gen. Porter, pre- 
parations were made for the second brigade to 
retire agreeable to order from Gen. Brown, as 
General Ripley at the time informed him. He 
also stated that Gens. Brown and Scott were both 
wounded and had left the field. Our army 
accordingly retired unmolested and it was his 
impression at the time that the whole column 
did not exceed 700 when the retrograde move- 
ment was made. It was understood that vast 
numbers were employed in carrying off the 
wounded. Others had given out for the want of 
w^ater. 

When the second brigade marched to the 
field of battle, they met a considerable number 
of the first brigade returning to camp, some 
slightly wounded and others carried off by those 
who were uninjured. Many wounded were l^ft on 
the ground after the battle, they being scattered 
over a considerable extent and the night dark, it 
was impossible to find them. He does not think any 
wounded of Brigadier Gen. Ripley's brigade was 



Military Life--1812-1815. 45 

left, unless some who attempted to get off without 
assistance and failed. 

When Gen. Ripley gave the order for the 
army to retire, he directed the vseveral command- 
ers of battalions to collect all the wounded, and in 
the interval before retiring, he used every exertion 
to have this order properly executed. 

While the army was moving back, and after- 
wards, he knows of no other measures being taken 
to furnish horses, supply drag ropes and bring 
off the artillery which remained on the heights, 
with the exception of the smaller ones, which 
had been rolled down the hill. 

After 12 o'clock at night the army regained 
their camp. The witness added that the pickets 
and washing parties were not brought up, nor at 
all engaged during the action. Shortly after the 
return to camp, about one o' clock, Maj. Gen. 
Brown directed Brigadier Gen. Ripley. 

The general order dissolving the court which 
follows, was at this period of investigation receiv- 
ed by the President and no further testimony was 
heard. 

I certify that the forgoing is a true copy of 
the minutes and proceedings of the court of 
Enquiry of which Major General H. Dearbon was 
President, so far as the court proceeded in the 
investigation of the subject matter enjoined by the 
general order constituting said court. 

(Signed) EVBRT A. BANKER, 

Judge Advocate. 

General Order, \ 

Adjutant and Ins. General's Office, > 
4th March,1815. ) 
The Court of Enquiry of which Major 
General Dearbon is President, which was ordered 
to investigate the conduct of Brigadier General 



46 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Riplejr, 

Ripley during the last campaign is discharged 
from the service. 

The congress of the United vStates having ap- 
prove his conduct by a highly complimentary re- 
solve, and the President being pleased to express 
his favorable opinion of the militar}^ character of 
Gen. Ripley, he will honorably resume his com- 
mand. By order: 

(Signed) D. PARKER, 

A. and I. General. 

As giving the salient points of the memorable 
battle of Ivundy's Lane, we give the following ex- 
tracts from Ingersol's History of the War of 1812:* 

"When the conflict began, the British could 
not have been less than from two thousand to 
twenty-five hundred strong. Their seven pieces 
of artillery were posted on the summit of a hill, 
supported by a heavy line of infantry, flanked by 
cavalry. vScott's advance was lead b}^ Captain 
Harris with his dragoons, and Captain Pentland's 
company of the 22d regiment, both officers much 
distinguished throughout the action, towards the 
end of which Pentland lost a leg, was left on the 
ground and taken prisoner. Between .Wilson's 
tavern and Lundy's Lane, near the village of 
Bridgewater, the British artillery opened upon 
Scott, who formed and reversed his column, falter- 
ing under its destructive severity. As it must be 
some time before Ripley's brigade and Porter's 
could come to Scott's aid, he detached Major Jes- 
sup with the 25th, to seek and engage the British 
left, while the General attacked their right. The 
other three regiments were moved beyond the ad- 

*C. J. Ingersol was a member of Congress from Pennsylva- 
nia from 1813 to 18 1 5, and from 1841 to 1844, and occupied a 
prominent position during the war in the republican part3% 



Military Life— 1812-1815. 47 

vanced companies, and stationed where, as well 
as during the change of position, their exposure 
and losses were so severe, that both McNeil and 
Brady, with many, if nOt most of the other of- 
oers, were disabled by wounds, and their 
regiments so much demolished as to be con- 
fused, some retreating, their ammunition, too, 
at last falling short. Towson's inimitable battery 
on the right, b}^ incessant reverberations of the, 
most exciting martial music, encouraged the col- 
umn, but the British guns were so high that his 
shot passed over them, while their's plunged 
down with deadly aim, and for some time Towson 
ceased firing, as useless. The action begun to-^ 
wards evening; for more than an hour it was 
maintained by the first brigade alone, notwith- 
standing great disadvantages to contend against, 
with the loss of half their force; Jessup's detach- 
ment, meanwhile, whose loss in killed and wound- 
ed was in proportion to the other regiments, 
never faltering in its singular episode, till the en- 
emy on the right were routed. By musketry, at 
a hundred j^ards, at first, and then the bayonet, 
the British left was put to flight b}' Jessup, who 
thereupon seized a road, which he discovered, to 
turn their flank, and with that advantage routed 
still more of them. vScott, with enthusiastic and 
matchless bravery, prosecuted his onset, a per-^ 
sonal exainple to all, if of extravagant, jet sustain-^ 
ed and invincible ardor. It was Jessup's good 
fortune, the common effect of good conduct, to 
capture General Riall retiring wounded, together 
with Captain Loring, aid-de-camp of Gen. Drum- 
mond, several other officers and altogether one 
hundred and sixty-nine prisoners — as many as 
were left unhurt of his own command. Drum- 
mond's dispatch confessed that on his arrival he 
found Riall's advance in full retreat, and when his 



48 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

own formation was completed, the whole front 
was warmly and closely engaged, the principal 
American efforts directed against the British left 
and center; after repeated attacks, those on the 
left forced back, and the Americans gaining tem- 
porary possession of the road." * * 

"As soon as Ripley heard Scott's firing, he 
formed his brigade. General Brown, whose aid 
Captain Austin, had been to inquire what firing it 
was, ordered Ripley's and Porter's brigades to 
the field, and his aid to tell Ripley where to take 
his station. Brown then with the engineer, Ma- 
jor McRae, hastened forward. Ripley and Porter 
lost no time, the men moving forward as rapidly 
as possible over the bridge and a distance of 
nearly three miles to the field of battle. It was 
night when they formed for action. The. formid- 
able annoyance of nine heavy cannon, Drummond 
having added two to Riall's seven in batterj^ on 
the top of a hill, at once suggested the obvious 
expediency if not absolute necessity, of over- 
coming so fatal a hinderance to any chance of suc- 
cess. It remains a matter of question whether 
Brown, Ripley, or McRae was first to declare that 
the battery on that hill must be stormed and 
taken. General Armstrong awards the honor to 
the engineer, Major McRae. The regiments of 
the second brigade were the 21st, Colonel James 
Miller, the 23d, Major McFarland, detachments of 
the 17th and 19th, with Captain Ritchie, of Major 
Hindman's battalion of artiller}^, preceded by 
Captain Biddle's artillery. The first regiment, 
Lieutenant Colonel Nicholas, was not attached to 
either brigade. General Ripley forthwith ordered 
the attack: Colonel Miller with the 21st regiment, 
to storm the park; Major McFarland with the 
23d regiment to take it in flank, and Colonel 



Military Life— 1812-1815. 49 

Nicholas to keep the musketry employed. After 
a few rounds, the men of the latter regiment 
recoiled and fell back in confusion. Major McFar- 
land was killed, and the 23d regiment also faltered 
and retreated. But Ripley soon restored them to 
good order and in person led them up the ascent, 
where they displayed in a few minutes as intend- 
ed. Miller, meanwhile unsupported by either the 
1st or 23d regiment nevertheless moved steadily 
upwards with unflinching intrepidity, drove the 
British from their guns at the point of the bay- 
onet, took their whole park, and tlien forming his 
line within twenty paces of the retiring but hardly 
retreating foe, at least twice his number, a perfect 
sheet of fire, at half pistol shot distance, signalized 
the desperate efforts of the victorious to retain, 
of the partially vanquished to regain the great 
armament and trophy, the palladium and key of the 
contest. During this struggle of seme continuance 
the 23d regiment, gallantly led by Gen. Ripley 
marched upon the tlank, by his order reserving 
their fire till within twenty paces, then poured it 
forth with such effect, that superadded to Miller's 
the British Avere driven down the, hill, leaving 
Ripley with the two regiments, in undisputed pos- 
session of the artillery and the eminence. In the 
darkness of the night during that extraordinary 
conflict, the British General Drummond in his 
offical report said, **in so determined a manner 
were the American attacks directed against our 
guns that our artillerj^men were ba^^oneted by 
them in the very act of loading, and the muzzles 
of the American guns were advanced within a 
few yards of ours." .t * * * 

"The British driven down that hill leaving 
their killed and wounded with their guns in charge 
of the conquerors, took shelter and counsel about 



50 Life of I^Ieazer Wheelock Ripl*ey. 

two hundred A^ardvS from and underneath it; where 
shrouded in profound darkness and disconifiture, 
they reorganized for another effort. vSoon after- 
wards some two hundred of the first regiment 
found their waA^ up the hill whither also Major 
Hindman repaired with Captian Towson and 
Ritchie with their guns; and for a short time, Gen- 
eral Brown was much elated with the triumph 
which he hoped would be conclusive." * 

"The toil and tug of war, however, were only 
begun,when they seemed to be over. When Riple}^ 
witli his 700 and Porter with his 500 men went to 
Scott's relief, reduced less than 400, as his brigade 
was broken into fragments, Drummond was stiin- 
ulated as well as strengthened for further efforts b}'^ 
the continual arrivals of fresh troops; the British 
Annual Register confesses 1200,under Col. Scott, re- 
ceived during the action. Moved by eve r}^ feeling 
of soldierly and national pride, dut}", and propriety, 
he was resolved to recapture the lost guns and 
restore the adverse fortune of the night excited 
by national even continental or hemispheric rival- 
ry." 

"After about half an hours absence from their 
place of retreat under the hill, being reorganized 
and reinforced, they were heard again moving up 
the ascent. Ripley closing his ranks, forbade all 
firing till the -flashes of the British musketry en- 
abled the Americans to aim unerringly — for that 
purpose to reserve fire till they felt the very 
push of the bayonet. vStill superior far in number, 
the British marched on again and after one dis- 
charge from the Americans as directed, many 
more rounds were exchanged between the com- 
batants for some twenty minutes in close and 
furious battle. Never good marksmen, however, 
and with the disadvantage of standing lower, the 



Military Life— IS 12-181 5. 51 

British now fired over the Americans, whose 
phinging shots were more effective, and the Brit- 
ish again forced to give way, retreated down the 
hill to their hiding place." 

"As the regiment under Colonel Nicholas, 
conducted by Major Wood, was taking position, 
General Brown rejjeated to Colonel Miller that he 
Avas to charge and take the battery with the bayo- 
net, to which he good humoredly answered. It 
shall be done sir." 

"After the enem3^'s repulse, when attempt- 
ing to retake the cannon, Brown and Scott meeting 
directed Leavenworth to take command of the 
battalion consolidated from the three regiments 
of infantr}^, which Avere formed in Lundy's Lane. 
The 1st, 21vSt, and 2od regiments were now on the 
hill, and Major Hindman, Captain Towson and 
Ritchie, with their guns on the summit near the 
chvirch. The 19th, 11th, and .22d consolidated, were 
on Lundy's lane in proximity with Captain Bid- 
die's company of artiller3^. The 25th, with Major 
Jessup, had returned and joined Leavenworth's 
battalion. Porter's volunteers gallantly led by him 
were with Ripley, and always among the foremost 
in the hottest fire, several of them killed, wounded 
and taken prisoners. After their victory the}' 
were api^roj^riately employed in escorting the 
British prisoners to their place of confinemefit 
in New York." ***** 

" vSeveral subsequent attempts were made by 
the English to retake the hill, each as desperate 
as the preceding, but equally ineffectual, when at 
last, dispairingof success they abandoned the field 
so hotly and fiercely contested till past midnight. 
By their official report of the battle they admitted 
a loss of eight hundred and seventy eight, in kill- 
ed, wounded and missing. The American loss 



5^ Life of Eleazer IVhe clock Ripley. 

was seven hundred and forty-three. Every gen- 
eral in both armies was wounded excei^t RipleA^ 
who had several shots in his hat. When the vic- 
tory was considered complete, Brown issued 
orders for a return to camp, and having as well as 
Scott, been wounded, he devolved the command 
upon Riple3% and was immediate^ conve^^ed to 
camp himself. Of the condition of the ami}- at 
this period and of the return to canip, Ingersol 
says: "All that remained of the first brigade, af- 
ter that terrible conflict, did not exceed two hun- 
dred and twenty men; the ninth, eleventh and the 
twenty-second regiments consolidated under Ma- 
jor Leavenworth, r*ot altogether one hundred. 
Many of the cartridges with which the American's 
fired, when attacked on the hill, were taken from 
the cartridge boxes of the English h^ing dead 
around them. Men and officers, after five hours 
constant fighting were completely exhausted, and 
many almost fainting with thirst. There was no 
water nearer than the Chippewa. Before they 
marched, however, from the hill, the wounded 
were carefully removed, and the return to the 
camp behind the Chippewa was slowly in perfect 
order, entirely undisturbed by the enemy. vSeven- 
t3-six officers were killed or wounded and six 
hundred and twentj^-nine rank and file, of whom 
the first brigade lost thirty-eight officers and four 
hundred and sixty-eight rank and file. The com- 
mander of the brigade and every regimental of- 
ficer were wounded." * * * 

"No battle in America, before or since, was 
ever so severely contested, or attended with casu- 
alties in proportion to numbers." * 

The failure to remove the captured cannon 
*Ingersolin 1849. 



Mintary Life—1812-lS13. 53 

and the return of the retreating eneiiiA^ to the bat- 
tle field, upon learning that the American army 
had returned to camp, caused the British com- 
mander to bivouac upon the battle field and claim 
the victory. The conduct of General Ripley be- 
came the subject of severe criticism and censure^ 
and, without inquiring into the motives of the 
misrepresentations which were heaped upon his 
head by some of his countr^^men, it is evident by 
a comparison of the preceding evidence of Capt. 
McDonald with subsequent disclosures of vScott 
and Brown that the latter,without just cause, look- 
ed with disfavor upon his conduct,and contributed 
to detract from the credit which was his due. In 
his memoirs, disagreeing with McDonald as to 
the number of charges made by the enemy and 
making an undeserved thrust at Ripley, Scott 
saA^s that in the second advance he (vScott) was 
prostrated "b}^ an ounce musket ball through the 
left shoulder joint" that "unable to hold up his 
head from the loss of blood and anguish, he was 
taken in an ambulance to the camp across the 
Chippewa, where the wound was staunched and 
dressed. 

"On leaving the field he did not know that Ma= 
jor General Brown, also wounded, had preceded 
him. B}^ seniority the command of the army 
now devolved upon Brigadier General Ripley. It 
must then have been about midnight. Ripley 
from some unknown cause, became alarmed and 
determined in spite of dissuasion, to abandon the 
field, trophies and all. The principal officers dis- 



54 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripler, 

patched a messenger to bring- baclr vScott, but 
found him utterly prostrate. Toward da}^ some 
fragments of the enemy, seeking the main bod}^ 
crossed the quiet field, and learning from the 
wounded that the Americans had flown, hastened 
to overtake Lieutenant General Sir Gordon Drum- 
mond below, who returned, bivouacked on the 
field, and claimed the victor}-." 

In connection with the battle, Scott also makes 
this extraordinary statement. He says that dur- 
ing the advance of the eneni}- upon one occasion, 
''leaving his brigade on the right in line, he form- 
ed a small column of some two hundred and fift}- 
men, and at its head, advanced rapidly to pierce 
the advancing enemys line, then to turn to the 
right and envelop his extreme left. If pierced 
in the dark, there seemed no doubt the whole 
would turn back, and so it turned out. Scott ex- 
plained his intentions and forcibly cautioned his 
own brigade and Ripley's on his left, not to fire 
upon the little column; but the instant the latter 
came in conflict with and broke the enemy Rip- 
le3-'s men opened fire upon its rear and left flank 
and caused it to break without securing a pris- 
oner." 

With regard to this daring, if not quixottic 
movement. General Brown says in his diary, that 
urged by General Riplc}- to order up General 
Scott who had been held in reserve with three bat- 
talions — he rode in person to General Scott and 
ordered him to advance, that the enemy was again 



Military Life— 1812-1815. 55 

Tepulsed by the whole line, and driven ont of sight 
and adds, "but a short time had elapsed when he 
Avas seen once more advancing in great force upon 
our main line of troops under Generals Ripley and 
Porter. General Scott was now on our left, had 
given to his column a direction which w^ould have 
enabled him in a few minutes to have formed line 
in the rear of the enemy's right, and thus have 
brought the enemy between two fires; but in a 
moment, most unexpectedly^ a flank fire from a 
party of the enemy concealed on our left, falling 
upon the center of vScott's command w^hile in open 
column, blasted our proud expectations; his col- 
umn was severed in two, one part passing to the 
rear, the other b}^ right flank of platoons towards 
our inain line." 

After the final repulse of the enemy and his 
disappearance from the field, the surmises and 
imputations of Scott upon the final conduct of 
Ripley and his return to camp, are thus discredited 
and dispelled by the testimony of Brow^n in his 
diary. "The enemy now seemed to be effectually 
routed; his force disappeared from the field. In 
a conversation which occured a few minutes after, 
betw^een the Major General, Major Wood and 
McRae, and tw^o or three other officers, it w^as the 
unanimous belief of all, that we had nothing more 
to apprehend from the foe w4th whom we had been 
contending; but it appeared to be admitted by the 
wdiole that it would be proper to return to camp. 
The idea did not occur to au}^ one present, that it 



56 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

would be necessar}" to leave behind a man or 
cannon/' * * * * 

*' As the Generail moved towards camp, many 
scattering men were seen by him on the. road; not 
a man was running away, none appeared to be 
alarmed, bnt having lost their officers, were seeking 
water, and \vere either drinking or struggling for 
drink. This scene assured the Major General 
that it was proper for the arn^ to return to camp 
in order that the scattering men might be ar- 
ranged to their companies and battalions, the arm}' 
reorganized and refreshed before morning. An 
officer w^as accordingly sent to saj' to General 
Ripley, that the wounded men and the captured 
cannon being brought off, the armj^ would return 
to camp." 

The testimony before the Court of Inquir}^ ex- 
plains what was done and why the order of Brown 
w^as not complied with in its entiret}^ w^hile the 
statement of the latter fully exposes Scott's 
" niikown cause" for the return of the army to 
camp and subject to ridicule his imputation that the 
movement originated w4th Ripley and was the 
result of alarm. 

General Brown w^as greatly anno^^ed at the 
failure to bring off the captured artillerj^ and was, 
perhaps, disposed to make Ripley the scape goat 
for any criticism that should arise on this accoiuit. 
His report to the secretary of war had for him no 
words of commendation, and says that within an 
hour after his return to camp, he was informed 



Military Life— 1812-1815. 57 

that Gen. Ripley had returned without annoyance 
and in good order "that he sent for him and 
directed hini to collect every description of force, 
to put himself on the field of battle as the day 
dawned and there to meet the enemy if he again 
appeared. To this order he made no objection 
and I relied upon its execution. It was not ex- 
ecuted." In his diary published subsequent- 
ly, he saj^s, "General Ripley being immediately 
sent for General Brown stated that there was no 
doubt in his mind, but that the enemy had retired, 
and that our victory was complete. He appeared to 
be of the same opinion as was every" officer pres- 
ent. General Brown then in strong and emphatic 
language, ordered General Ripley to reorganize 
his battalions, to see that they were refreshed with 
whatever could be afforded in camp, and put him- 
self with all the men he could muster, of every 
corps, on the field of battle, as the day dawned, 
there to be governed by circumstances,at all events 
to bring off the captured cannon. It Avas not be- 
lived that the enemy would dare to attack him if 
he showed a good countenance. General Ripley 
left General Brown under the conviction that he 
would execute the order given to him; he did not 
make the slighest objection to it, none was 
suggested from any quarter." From this state- 
ment the following deductions naturally follow; 
that Ripley had no cause to object as he, as well 
as Brown and the other officers, believed that the 
victory was complete, that the battle field was un- 
occupied, and that the English, if they reappeared, 



58 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

not the Americans, would be the attacking part}--. 
Had Brown been apprised of the actual state of 
facts as they existed at the moment, would 
not a peremptory order to General Riple^^ to 
become the attacking party been looked upon as 
an indication of niilitar}- imbecility? 

In alluding to this subject, Ingersol, in his 
history of the war, says; " All this, which became 
the subject of much controversy among the Amer- 
ican officers, discrediting or defending I^iple}^, 
was more dexterously than candidh^, but so com- 
monl}^ as to be almost always the case on such 
occasions, therefore not unpardonable, was turned 
by General Drummond into evidence that he was 
not conquered, but conqueror, 

" A howitzer, which the enern}-^ brought up 
was captured b}^ us" said his dispatch. They 
captured nothing, but merely found a cannon 
accidentally left, when an hour after the enemj^'s 
retreat, their conquerors in complete and undis- 
turbed possession of the guns and the field, slowly 
and in perfect order left it, and then to return to 
the indispensable repose of the camp. The 
struggle was over. Pride of success was sup- 
planted by bodil}' exhaustion, anxiety for repose 
from excessive toil, and relief from tormenting 
thirst. The Americans therefore, but as victors, 
were marched to their camp as Brown had directed, 
though without the cannon as he had ordered. 
Vexed, mortified, stung b}^ the omission to bring 
them awa}", when he heard of it, he unwittingly 



Military Life— 1812-1815. 5a 

countenanced General Druniniond's unfair as- 
sumption b}^ censuring General Ripley, ordering 
him to march next morning at sunrise to reoccupy 
the hill and bring away the guns, which was im-. 
possible. Ripley's division fit for that morning 
did not exceed sixteen hundred men; in the judge- 
ment of man}^ if not most of the officers, it would 
have been madness, with such a force, hardly re- 
freshed from yesterday's labor (for sunrise caniC' 
in three hours after their repose began, the night 
of the battle) to storm the hill of Bridgewater 
again." , . 

At the commencement of the battle on tiiC' 
2Qth, the Eriglish force has been estimated at 1637 
naen, increased b^^ reinforcements during the j en.-, 
gagementto 5130, including 3450 reguJ^ar.^, 1200 in- 
cprporated niilitiaand'480 Indians. The Americaii 
force was 750 augmented during thie battle to 2417, 
including , the 2d brigade a detachnient of.a.rtiK 
lery and 600 volunteers. The loss- upon the 
American side in killed and wounded, was abot:ft 
one third of their number, with an equal or greater 
loss upon the part of the enemy. 

On the morning of the 26th General Ripley, 
pursuant to the orders of General Brown, again 
took up the march to the battle field, but finding it 
in the possession of the enemy, reinforced and 
strongly fortified, he abandoned the idea of 
making an attack and commenced a retrograde 
movement upon Fort Erie. Before doing this, 
however, he visited General Brown and explained 



GO Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

to liini the condition of affairs and urged the 
abandonment of an attack upon the enemy. 
Brown insisted upon it, and as if still unconvinced 
of its hopelessness, would not yield an inch until 
the interview finally closed with this result as 
given in Brown's diar}-; "General Brown persisted 
when he informed the general, that General Porter 
was also opposed to proceeding. At these words, 
General Brown replied, "vSir you will do as you 
please;" and had no futher intercourse with him 
until they met at Buffalo." 

Although at the expense of adding to Brown's 
enmity to himself, there is little doubt that 
Ripley's persistence at this time saved the Amer- 
ican army from annihilation. Left to do as he 
pleased. General Ripley immediately commenced 
a retreat to Fort Erie where General Brown 
determined to make a stand, instead of evacuating 
the Canadian side where he doubtless expected to 
be able to maintain his position until reinforce- 
ments should arrive imder General Izard, in com- 
mand of a large force at Sacketts Harbor; his expec- 
tation of these however was not to be realized. 

Destro^ang the bridge across the Chippewa, 
and throwing every possible obstacle in the way 
of the enemy's advance. General Ripley arrived 
at Fort Brie on the 27th, and immediately applied 
himself with indefatigable zeal in strengthening 
the fortifications and rendering them secure against 
the anticipated attack. As soon as he could gain a 
short respite from these indispensable labors, he 



Mintary Uie~-lS 12-1815. 81 

Siastened to pa}"- a fitting- tribute to the 2d brigade 
ior their gallantrj^ at Lundy's Lane. In his bri- 
gade orders issued -at Fort Erie on the next day he 
comtnended especiall}"^ the gallantry of Colonel 
Nicholas and Major Brook, and of Colonel Millef 
he said "To Col. Miller of the 21st regiment, he re- 
turned more than his thanks. He deserved the 
.gratitude and approbation of the nation; nevef 
was an enterprise more heroically executed; nevef 
was tJie vaior of a veteran more proudly displayedv 
The brigadier general was satisfied \Cith the con- 
duct of his staff, Lieutenant McDonald of the 19th 
and Lieutenant Clark of the llth. The officers of 
the brigade have to mourn the loss of Major Mc- 
Farland of the 23d and Lieutenant Bigelow of the 
21st regiment." 

The enem^^ did not arrive before the fort un- 
til the od of August, by which time, owing to the 
unceasing efforts of General Ripley, it had been 
made secure against an immediate assault> and 
presented such a formidable front as to induce 
the eneni}^ to resort to a regular investments 
Both sides henceforth applied themselves vigor- 
ously for assault and defence. Soon aftef the 
siege commenced, General Gaines, Ripley's senior, 
arrived and assumed the command being sum- 
moned by Brown for this purpose, w*hile his dis- 
pleasure towards Ripley was at fever heat on the 
day after the battle of Lundj^'s Lane. Gaines was 
satisfied with the arrangments for defence and 
made no alterations in them. The American force 
at this time was composed of the first and second 



62 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

brigades, and Porter's volunteers, greatl}'' reduced 
in numbers by the battle of the 25th, and an addi- 
tional small force of New York and Penns3dvania 
volunteers, the whole combined estimated by Gen- 
eral Drummond not to exceed fifteen hundred men 
fit for dut3% and which he believed w-as iiiadequate 
to prevent his carrying the fort by storm. This 
he determined to do and with this object, on the 
morning of the fifteenth, three columns of nearly 
four thousand men, w^ith s^eei as their watchword 
and relying upon the bayonet, advanced to the as- 
sault. . . ; . ' ; 

General Ripley, whose: watchfuliiess was un- 
ceasing; on the fourteenth, about midnight, dis- 
covered indicatiohs'of 'an assault,* had hife brigade 
instantly formed and dispatched his' aid, then 
Lfieutenant Kirb3"/ to, commtitiicate his impres- 
sions to General Gaines. The^Ci were soon verifi- 
ed b}" the firing of the pitket guard, which re- 
treated to the works under the conimand of Lieu- 
tenant Belknap, who more anxious ior his men 
than himself, was wounded as he was the last in 
entering through the entr^^ port, : The English 
columns rvished to the assault Avith desperate fury. 
On the left, where Towson's batterj^ and; Ripley's 
brigade were stationed, the latter in a line from 
the battery to the lake, the advancing column w^as 
received with svich a destructive fire from the 
battery and the second brigade as to recoil in con- 
fuvsion. Repeated atteinpts upon this part of the 
intrenchments were equally unfortunate and dis- 
astrous. 



Military Life— 1812-1815. 63 

Upon the right and the center, the attack wai§ 
■not so easih^ repelled, notwithstanding the gal- 
lantry^ of Porter and his brave associates. After 
several attempts, a lodgment was made in the 
bastion, and the enemy fought with desperation 
to retain it, but were finally defeated in this, and 
toward dawn fled in disorder, leaving the com- 
manders of two of the columns dead, with a fur- 
ther loss of 222 dead, 174 wounded and 186 prison- 
ers besides a great many killed and wounded who 
had fallen in the lake. Their whole loss was esti- 
mated at 962 and that of the Americans at 84. 

As p-iving; the incidents of the battle niore in 
detail, we extract the following from an Americaii 
historian:* 

"General Gaine's position on the margin of 
the lake, where the river Niagara empties into it, 
a horizontal plain a few feet above the water, was 
strengthened by breastworks in front, entrench- 
ments and batteries. The small unfinished Fort 
Erie w^as defended by Captain Williams, support- 
ed by Major Trimble's infantr^^; the front batteries 
by Captains Biddle and Fanning, the left by a re- 
doubt of which Captain Towson had charge, all 
the artillery commanded by Major Hindman. 
Lieutenant Colonel Aspinwall was at the head of 
the 9th, 11th and 22d regiments of infantry, from 
a few weeks of admirable service became the vet- 
eran brigade of vScott. General Ripley command- 
ed his own brigade, the 21st and 23d regiments. 

^Ingersol. 



04 Life of EleRZer Wheelock Riplej'', 

General Porter, with the New York and Pennsyl- 
vania volunteers, occupied the center. Colonel 
Fischer, of De Watterville's regiment, led one of 
the British columns; Colonel Druniniond a second, 
Lietitenaut Colonel Scott the third. The first 
point assaulted was defended by Major Wood, of 
the engineers, volunteering to head the 21st regi- 
ment of infantry, and by Captain Towson. Wad- 
ing breast deep through the water, the British 
column advanced in the dark within ten feet of 
the American line again and again, but was con- 
stantly repulsed. The left, attacked b}- Scott, was. 
defended by Major McRae, with the 9th regiment 
under Captain Foster, and New York and Penn- 
sylvania volunteers, under Captains Bovighton and 
Harding; Colonel Drummond, with his columu 
and the seamen under Captain Dobbs, assaulted 
the center with a daring courage, of which human- 
ity was no part. With scaling ladders he led his. 
sanguinary followers up the parapet of the old 
Fort, but was driven back with great carnage. 
Again twice mounting after being thrice repelled, 
they moved around b}^ the ditch in total darkness, 
and once mounting with scaling ladders, overpow- 
ered and killed with pikes and bayonets Williams 
and McDonough with several men, severely' 
wounding Lieutenant Watmough and carried the 
bastion, of which for more than an hour they held 
possession, defeating reiterated efforts of our peo- 
ple to dislodge them. There it was that Mc- 
Donough, overcome, entreating quarter in vain, 
and desperately defending his life with a hand- 



Military Life~18 12-18 15. 65 

spike, was murdered by Drummond, who himself 
was shot in the breast, by a soldier and put to 
death, with no quarter, expiring on his lips, as he 
fell. Repulsed on the left, master of the fort in 
the centre, and strenuously contending for 
f jothold on the right, the enemy for a long time 
maintained the battle fiercely raging. General 
Gaines, while striving to regain the bastion, order- 
ed reinforcements also to the right, which were 
promptl^^ sent by General Ripley and Porter, both 
of whom were constantly active and sagacious to 
face every danger and suppl}^ every want. The 
victory was in no small measure ascribable to the 
infantry covering the artillery and protecting them 
at their guns. While Major Hindman and Trim- 
ble, Captains Foster and Byrdsall, repeatedl}^ 
failed by many devices of dauntless courage to re- 
cover the bastion, of which the enemy kept pos- 
session for more than an hour, and the conflict on 
the right was still undetermined, an accident fixed 
the fate of the right, as, and nearly where a similar 
occurrence brought it on. Some cartridges dejDOs- 
ited in a stone building, occupied b}^ the Amer- 
icans, near the bastion, held by the British, explod- 
ed with terrible uproar which struck the latter 
with panic. In vain their surviving officers assur- 
ed their men ^that it was an accident, not a mine, 
and endeavored to rally them to renewed contest. 
Captain Biddle at that crivsis, by General Gaine's 
direction, wounded as the Captain was, by a shell 
contusion, enfilated with his piece the exterior 
plain and glacis, while Captain Fanning from his 



ee Life of Bleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

batter}^ dealt execution upon the eneni}^ who all 
fled towards dawn in complete disorder and dis- 
nmy. * * * * 

" Foiled in this first attack on Towson's 
batter3% supported by the 21st infantr}^ again 
repulsed by Riple}^ and Wood, attempting to turn 
the Avestern batteries, and though for a while in 
possession of an exterior central bastion, at length 
driven from every point, in panic and confusion, 
with a loss of a fourth of their force. The enemy 
b}^ this defeat suffered a lesson of lasting impres- 
sion which was not disguised in the official dis- 
patches of Colonel Fisher, General Drummond and 
General Prevost." 

In his official report of the assault. General 
Gaines saj^s: "To brigadier General Riplc}" much 
credit is due for the judicious disposition of the 
left wing, previous to the action and for the 
steady disciplined courage manifested b}^ him and 
his immediate command, and for the promptitude 
with which he complied with my orders for rein- 
forcements during the action." 

• On the 17th, General Riple^^ made a report to 
his superior officer, in which he highly compli- 
mented those under his immediate command and 
from which we make the following extract. 

"Briecadier General Gaines. 

Sir: — I take the libert}' of reporting to you]the 
course of operations on the left flank of the camp 
during the action of the 15th ins. 



Military Life— 18 12-18 15. : 67 

"From indications satisfactory to nie, I was 
persuaded very earlj^ of the eneni3^'s design of 
attacking us in our position. Before any alarm I 
caused my brigade to occupy their alarm post. On 
the first fire of the picket, Captain Towson opened 
his artillery upon them from Fort Williams, in a 
style which does him infinite credit ; it was contin- 
ued with very great effect upon the enemy, during 
the whole action. 

" The enemy advanced with fixed bayonets, 
and attempted to enter our works between the fort 
and water. They brought ladders for the purpose 
of scaling, and in order to prevent their troops 
from resorting to any other course, excepting the 
bayonet, had caused all their flints to be taken from 
their muskets. The column that approached in 
this direction consisted of, and amounted to at 
least 1500 men and according to the representations 
of the prisoners they were 2000 strong. The com- 
panies posted at the points of the works which 
they attempted to escalade, were Captain Ross's 
Captain Marston's,Lieutenent Bowman's and Lieu- 
tenent Larned's of the 21st regiment, not exceed- 
ing 250 men under the command of Major Wood 
of the engineer corps. On the enemy's approach, 
they opened their inusketry upon them in a inan- 
ner the most powerful; Fort Williams and this 
little band emitted one broad uninterrupted sheet 
of light — the enemy were repulsed. They rallied, 
came on a second time to the chaige, ard a party 
waded round our line by the lake, and came in 



68 Life of Bleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

on the flank: but a reserve of two companies 
posted in the coniniencenient of the action to sup- 
port this point, inarched up and fired upon the 
party — they were all killed or taken. Five times 
did the enemy advance to the charge; five times 
were their columns beaten back in the utmost 
confusion by a force, one sixth of their number; 
till at length, finding the contest unavailing, they 
retired. At this point we inade 147 prisoners. 

"During the contest in this quarter, the lines 
of the whole left wing were perfectly lined, in 
addition to the reserved; and I found myself able 
to detach three companies of the 23d regiment 
from the left, to reinforce the troops at Fort Erie, 
viz. Capt. Wattler's, Lieut. Cantines and Lieut. 
Brown's companies, and one of the 17th under 
Chum? They were in the fort during the time of 
the explosion and their conduct is highly spoken 
of by their commander, Major Brooks, their com- 
manding officer." 

Thus signally and disastroush^ foiled in the 
attempt to carry the American intrenchments by 
storm, the enemj^ again directed their efforts to 
investment and cannonade in the hopes of com- 
pelling their abandonment, while the intervening 
space between the opposing forces was the scene 
of frequent skirmishes. 

On the 2d of September, General Brown re- 
sumed the command, and while the enemy prose- 
cuted the investment with unabated ardor. Brown 
was equall}' intent upon preventing the capture of 



Militarr LUe— 1812-1815. 60 

the Fort. With the inferior force under his com- 
mand, his mind was filled with anxiety, and while 
determined to hold out to the last, and if possible, 
triumph over the enemy, he still looked abroad 
for help. On the 10th he wrote to General Izard, 
then in command of a large force on its way to 
Sacketts Harbor, imploring aid. With a total 
force not exceeding two tliousand men opposed to 
four thousand on the part of the enemy, he said; 
"'I will not conceal from you tliat the fate of this 
army is very doubtful, unless speedy relief is af- 
forded." Izard's tardy advance caused Brown to 
loose all hope of timely aid from him, and to feel 
the necessity of relying solely upon the courage 
and zeal of his own small force. With an army 
too small to encounter the enemy in a pitched bat- 
tle in an open field, it was apparent that unless 
Canada should be promptly evacuated, which 
would imply that the object of the campaign was 
a failure, the road to safety lay in the surprise 
and destruction of tlie works before the3'' could be 
protected by an adequate force. Ascertaining the 
manner in which the enemy prosecuted the con- 
struction of their works and the location of their 
troops, Brown determined upon a sortie which 
he believed would prove eminently successful. 

The result answered his most sanguine ex- 
pectations. The British army was encamped 
about two miles from their works, which were 
carried on by parties detailed for that purpose 
under the protection of a brigade of infantry. To 
resist this force and demolish the works, consist- 



70 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Riplej^. 

ing of two batteries and the third already far ad- 
vanced, was the important object in view. Alert- 
ness, preparation and courage on the part of the 
enemy, such as was exhibited b}" their foes in the 
previous attempt to storm and capture the Amer- 
ican works, would probably have brought the 
movement to a disastrous end. About mid-da}^,, 
on the 17th of the month, the American troops 
started upon the perilous enterprise. General 
Porter was ordered to make a detour with his vol- 
unteers "on the rig-ht, and throw themselves on 
the front and rear of the entrenchments, the first 
brigade under General Miller was ordered to ad- 
vance between the two forts and to divide and at- 
tack each of them in flank, while General Ripley 
was placed in command of the reserve to be ready 
for an}^ emergency." 

The duties assigned to the different corps 
were performed with alacrity and courage, the ob- 
ject of the sortie was completely attained, but 
while occupied in sustaining those engaged in the 
demolition of the hostile batteries, General Rip- 
\^j was struck b^- a musket shot which passed 
through his neck and he fell senseless to the 
ground. An officer who was by his side at the 
time he fell, in a letter to a friend in Pittsfield, 
Massachusetts, saj^s: "That all the troops partici- 
pated in the action and that towards the close of 
it as the General was at the head of the 23d regi- 
ment, then closely engaged at the distance of 
twent}^ yards from the enemy he received a mus- 
ket shot which penetrated his neck between the 



miliary LUe—lSn-1815. 71 

throat and spine, entering in front of the right 
:artery and passing out behind the left artery. His 
aid carried him from the fiekl of battle, insensible 
throup-h the flow of blood."* From the effects of 
this wound he liever recovered, his neck remain- 
ing stiff until the day of his death. 

Of the dut}^ to be performed by the assailing 
columns and of the result says Ingersol, "There 
w^ere three British batteries in charge, at the 
moment, of the King's and De Wateryille's regi- 
ments, then on dntj. Announced by tremendous 
fire from the fort, the rain falling in torrents, so 
as to render impossible the free use of fire arms, 
Porter led his column close up to the enemy's en- 
trenchments, turned their right without being 
perceived by their picketvS, and soon carried by 
storm, battery number 3, together with a strong 
blockhouse. Thence instantly moving on batter}^ 
number 2, he there met a stouter resistance. Cok 
onel Gibson was killed there, but after an obstinate 
combat, our people got possession of the second 
batter3\ The intrepid Miller, for wdiom batteries 
had no terrors, then b^^ Brow^n's direction seized 
the moment to pierce the enemy's entrenchments 
betw^een the two captured batteries, attacking 
the third battery. Davis and Wood fell, but again 
the enemy w^as overcome, and abandoned his last 
battery. In half an hour after the first shot the 
three batteries and two blockhouses w^ere taken, 
the magazine blown up, all the guns rendered us- 

*NiksReg., Nov. 5, 18 14. 



72 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

less and every object of the sortie accomplished, 
with considerable loss, indeed, but beyond Gen- 
eral Brown's most sanguine expectations. Gen, 
Ripley was then ordered up to superintend the 
difficult operation which General Miller had begun, 
of withdrawing the troops from their conquest and 
leading them back to Fort Erie, an ox:)eration 
which Gen. Brown with his staff, personally svtper- 
intended. In the performance of that duty Rijiley, 
while speaking watli Colonel Upham received a 
severe w^ound in the neck, from which he never 
recovered, though he survived many 3^ears, and 
served at one time in Congress from Louisiana." 
The whole British loss in killed, wounded, pris- 
oners, and missing, was placed by Brown at one 
thousand men. As soon as the firino- was heard. 
General Drummond had hastened to the scene of 
action and directed also his energies to the rallying 
of liis retreating and discomfited troops and re- 
gaining the captured entrenchments, wliile Brown, 
with his design fully accomplished, was equall}^ 
intent upon withdrawing his own troops to the pro- 
tection of his defences. This he successful)^ per- 
formed, but found that the operations of the da}^ 
had resulted in a loss to the Americans of five 
htmdred and eleven killed, wovmded and missing. 

This days work destroyed the hopes of the 
enem}^, and General Drummond immediately 
abandoned his position and sought safety be3^ond 
the Chippewa, where he fortified himself against 
attack. Before attempting to follow with his infer- 
ior force,Brown waited anxiously for the arrival of 



Military Life— 1812-1815, 73 

Izard so that a forward movement could be made 
with their combined armies. Inclement weather, 
bad roads and an aversion, it w^as said, on the part 
of Izard to co-operate w^ith Brown, had, however, 
made the advance of Izard's army slow and un- 
reliable. Armstrong, having left the war depart- 
ment, w^as succeeded by Monroe, who issued an 
order on the 27th of September to Izard, directing 
him to assume command of his and Brown's unit- 
ed forces, urging him to action and assuring him 
of the confidence of the government in his gallant- 
ry and ability. On the 5th of October, Brown and 
Porter had an interview wdth Izard at Lewistow^n, 
both eager for co-operation in Canada. On the 
8th Izard made an abortive attempt to cross the 
Niagara and land his division in the face of the 
British batteries at Chippewa, but on the 10th 
and 11th landed near Fort Erie. The combined 
divisions amounted to six thousand men, while 
the force of the enemy was estimated at three 
thousand with the advantages of a fortified position. 
On the 14th of October, Izard appeared before the 
British intrenchments, but while willing to receive 
an attack would not venture to assail the British 
position, and amid the chagrin and indignation of 
his army and of his countrymen, he broke up his 
encampment on the 21st, prepared to go into win- 
ter quarters, withdrew his army from Canada, and 
on the 5th of November, Fort Erie, the last vestige 
of American prowess on Canadian soil, w^as blown 
up by Major Totten of the engineer corps. 

After protracted and severe suffering, General 



74 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

Ripley so far recovered as to be able to travel, and 
started for Albany, where he arrived in January, 
1815. During his long prostration, he received the 
constant and unremitted attention of his wife to 
whom he was married in 1811, and who was the 
daug-hter of the Reverend Thomas Allen, of Pitts- 
field, Massachusetts, a distinguished Revolutionary 
patriot. In an article in a Philadelphia Magazine,* 
in 1815, in reference to General Ripley, the writer 
paid her this tribute. "During this period of pain 
and danger, there was b}^ his side, one who had 
previously shared his labors and privations, and 
now like a ministering angel assuaged his suffering. 
To this benign influence he maj^ be considered 
indebted, not only for solace, but for the contin- 
uance of life!" The announcement of peace, which 
soon followed, rendered his presence unnecessary 
upon the frontier, and as soon as returning health 
permitted, he demanded and put in motion a 
Court of Inquiry as to his military conduct, which 
had been missrepresented and traduced. 

Unfortunately, parties sometimes exist in 
armies as well as in the domain of politics, and 
Ripley undoubtedly felt that there was not onh^ the 
mutual rivalr}^ of brigades, with one of which he 
was so prominently and closely associated, but 
that he had also to defend himself from the enmity 
and attacks of his superior officer, and of others, 
who, from whatever cause, under the shelter of 
Brown's name and encouragement, had waged an 

*Port Folio. 



Military Life— 1812-1815. 75 

unjust and calumnious warfare upon his reputation. 
He had disapproved of Brown's movement into 
Canada, when it was made; he had not, for per- 
sonal glory and from undervaluation of the 
bravery, strength and skill of the enemy, proposed 
on the 24th and the morning of the 25th, as Scott 
had, to march with a single brigade to Burlington 
Heights, a project which was soon proved by 
events to be wholly impracticable; when ordered by 
Brown, on the morning after the battle of Lundy's 
Lane to return to the battle field, he had dared by 
his persistency, to save the army in the face of 
Brown's exasperation and displeasure. On the 
other hand conscious that whenever advising, he 
frankly had done so upon his personal responsibili- 
ty and to the best of his ability, and that whenever 
acting he had performed his whole duty, he felt 
keenly the attacks that were made upon him. 
He shrank not from,but courted a public, a solemn 
and official investigation of his military conduct. 
He desired that all the facts should be presented 
in authentic shape for the impartial judgement of 
his countrymen, and so as not to be distorted upon 
the pages of history. Upon these he did not 
wish to be measured by the standard prepared for 
him by interested foes orniilitary rivals and aspir- 
ants. 

As we have already seen only one witness had 
been partly examined when the Court of Inquiry 
was unexpectedly dissolved by an order dated the 
4th of Ma}^, 1815, with ostensible reasons highly 



76 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

gratifying to his feeling and honorable to his rep- 
utation. The current of public opinion flowed 
strongly in his favor. Congress voted him a gold 
medal, for his gallant conduct at Chippewa, Lun- 
dy's lyane and Fort Krie, testimonials of esteem 
on every hand reminded him that his countrymen 
appreciated his services and at last, even Brown 
himself, whatever may have been his mental res- 
ervations and secret animosity, felt constrained to 
contribute the following letter to his vindication: 

Washington City, Ma^^ 1815. 

Sir: — M3' report of the 7th of August, created 
an impression in relation to General Ripley" which 
I by no means intended. I did not intend to im- 
plicate his courage, his talents or his zeal. 

In this report I stated that I had given him 
orders to meet and beat the eneni}^ on the morn- 
ing of the 26th of July. This order was not given 
until after the command of the army had devolved 
entirely upon General Riple}^ and I am fully con- 
vinced that circumstances afterwards occurred to 
satisf}^ the judgment of Gen. Riply that the order 
could not be executed. 

Justice to myself, as well as the arm}-, require 
that I should make this statement. 

I am etc., 

(Signed) Jacob Brown. 
Hon. Alexander A. Dallas, 



Military Life— 1812-1815. 77 

Upon its face the letter would indicate the gen- 
erosity and frankness of a noble-hearted soldier^ 
anxious to repair an unintended injury to a brave 
and gallant comrade. The reparation to be satis- 
factory and complete required a publicity co-ex- 
tensive with the unintended and undeserved wrong. 
Yet subsequent disclosures, made many years after 
both had been consigned to their tombs, throw a 
shadow upon the sincerity and magnanimity of 
Brown, and that while endeavoring to ingratiate 
himself with John Q. Adams, just elevated to the 
presidency, he was engaged in prejudicing the 
mind of the latter against Ripley. 

In his diary under date of November, 1825, 
Adams gives this exposure of Brown's feelings. 
''Brown, general, with whom I resumed and fin- 
ished the conversation concerning the postmaster 
general, Mr. McLean, and H. Lee, of whom I spoke 
to him as I felt. I had also read through and re- 
turned to him his manuscript, narrative and docu^ 
ments, relating to the Niagara campaign of 1814. 
His opinion of Riple^^'s shrinking from responsi- 
bility, the influence under which he altered his 
report to the war department, containing an im- 
plied charge against Ripley, and gave him a cer- 
tificate of good conduct under a promise that it 
should be confidential and never published, the 
subsequent allusion to it by Ripley in a publica- 
tion, and the interposition of Mr. Dallas and Mr. 
Monroe to pacify these differences were, in all 
their details, new to me. Brown thinks that the 



78 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

anxiety to retain Ripley as a New England man in 
the service as inajor general at the reduction of 
the army in 1816, was to propitiate a powerful in- 
fluence of Mr. Monroe's electioneering part}^ for 
the then ensuing election of P. U. S. 



CHAPTER II. 

Upon the return of peace, the army was re- 
duced to a peace establishment and was re-organ- 
ized. Two Major Generals, Jackson and Brown, 
and four Major Generals by brevaet, Macomb, 
Gaines, Scott and Ripley were retained in the ser- 
vice. Macomb entered the army in 1801 as second 
lieutenant of dragoons. Gaines entered the ser- 
vice in 1799 as second lieutenant in the 6th infan- 
try; Scott followed him in 1808 as captain of light 
artillery, and Ripley followed him in 1812 as lieu- 
tenant colonel. The United States was divided 
into two military divisions, Jackson being assigned 
to the command of the southern and Brown of the 
northern, and General Ripley was assigned to 
duty in the division of the latter, and on the 27th 
of May, 1815, issued orders upon assuming com- 
mand of his department, which included New 
Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut and 
Rhode Island. He immediately started upon a 
tour of inspection and upon his route was greeted 
by the most gratifying demonstrations of the deep 
hold that he had secured in the hearts of his old 
friends and neighbors. He was met and escorted 
into Portland by a large cavalcade irrespective 
of party. Bath greeted him with enthusiasm, and 
when he visited Hanover, his native town, he was 
received with every mark of respect and personal 
attachment, and was presented by the citizens 



80 Life of Eleazer IVheelock Ripley, 

with a sword * as a testimonial of their apprecia- 
tion of his gallant services in behalf of his coun- 
try. The surrounding- circumstances brought to 
mind in vivid contrast his dejjarture from them 
a few years previous, a poor j^outh to seek his 
fortunes upon the frontier of Maine, and his then 
position as a major general in the army of the 
United States, a distinction won, when only thirty- 
three 3-ears of age, for gallant and meritorious 
conduct on the field. 

His headquarters were fixed at Boston, and 
while here his notice was attracted to a recent 
publication, which abounded in the grossest mis- 
representations of the conduct of the American 
army at the capture of York, (Toronto) in upper 
Canada. Indignant at such a perversion of facts, 
which if true, discredited the army and placed 
them upon a level with a horde of marauding van- 
dals, he hastened to repel the unjust and malig- 
nant imputations; and to place the history of the 
affair in its true colors; he addressed the following 
letter, intended for publication, to his old com- 
mander. General Dearborn: 

Headquarters, Boston, Aug. 15, 1815. 

Sir: — I take the liberty to state the occur- 
rences at York, after the capture of that place b}^ 
the American force on the 27th of April, 1813. 
You will then e able to determine how much 
truth there is in the work entitled "A Continua- 

*Niles' Reg., Vol. 11, p. 62. 



reace Bstahlishnient— 1815-1820. 81 

tion of Goldsmith'vS History of England," so far 
as relates to the following- article. 

Previous to the place being- carried, an order 
had been issued by the ever to be lamented and 
gallant General Pike, prohibiting every species of 
plundering or depredation under the penalty of 
death. After the cajoitulation, a guard was post- 
ed in the town, by direction of General Dearborn, 
to carry this order into the strictest effect. As 
field officer of the day, during the first night, I 
had occasion repeatedl}' to visit the guard and al- 
ways discovered it extreuiel3^ vigilant and atten- 
tive. The next morning I had occasion about 
seven or eight o'clock to visit the town. I met a 
straggler of the voliinteers with his knapsack full 
of plate. I ascertained it belonged to a lad}'^, the 
daughter of Honorable Judge Powell; it was im- 
mediatel3^ returned to her. I reported the cir- 
cumstance to General Dearborn, who ordered 
the man confined, and directed me to order up 
the 21st regiment under the command of Major 
Grafton to the town, for the purpose of protecting 
the inhabitants. The officers were quartered in 
the town, and the S3^stem established was for sen- 
tinels to be stationed to prevent depredation 
wlienever it was requested. If this regiment did 
its dut3^ it will at once be perceived that there 
could be no plundering; and that it did perform 
its dut3^ will appear from several circumstances; 
that the knapsack of ever3^ man was searched 
previous to embarking, and not an article of plund- 
ered proper t3" was found; that the inhabitants of 



82 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley, 

York were particularly pleased with their deport- 
ment ill the city, and on every occasion testified 
their gratitude for their protection and when Cap- 
tain Pelham was wounded and taken prisoner at 
Chiystler's Field, no sooner was it known that he 
was on duty in the regiment which protected the 
propert}^ of the inhabitants of York, than at the 
intercession of many respectable officers of the 
British army, he was paroUed by Sir George Pro- 
vost, on that very account expressed in his letter, 
notwithstanding other officers at the same time 
were imprisoned under the question of retaliation 
agitated between the governments of the two na- 
tions; an instance of liberality' which shows that acts 
of courtesy and kindness were properl}' appre- 
ciated by that officer. 

Previous to the 21st regiment being ordered 
to the city of York, two buildings that had been 
evacuated and stood detached, had been stripped 
of many valuable articles and a schooner (private 
property) was also destroyed. When these facts 
were made known to Major General Dearborn, 
he instantly ordered the claims for damages to be 
liquidated, and payment to be made. It was done. 
In the case of the property taken from the build- 
ings, it was made to the proprietors personall3^ 
In that of the schooner, as the owner was absent 
from town. Major General Dearborn sent the 
money to Judge Scott, who receipted for it. 

When the place was captured, large stores of 
flour, feed and peas were found in the depot. 



Peace Bstcihlishment— 1815-1820. 83 

Agreeably to the articles of capitulation, these 
were delivered to us. Major General Dearborn 
directed a large proportion of them to be deliv- 
ered to the needy in the cit}^ and particidarlj- to 
the widows and families of the British and Cana- 
dian soldiers who had been killed in the action. 
In addition to this, considerable quantities were 
deposited with the clergymen of the place to be 
distributed in a similar manner. 

I have seen manj^ British officers, who have 
always complimented our forces for their liberali- 
ty of conduct on this occasion, manifested at York, 
and the inhabitants had applauded it in such for- 
cible terms, that they had even been accused of 
dislo3^alty by the British arm}^ As respects the 
manner in which York was stated to be evacuated, 
in the work to which I have alluded, it is perfectl}^ 
incorrect. The object of striking York at the 
opening of the campaign, was solely to destroy 
the frigate building there, and the military and 
naval depot. The first object was effected in 
order to ensure our control of Lake Ontario dur- 
ing the campaign of 1813. The second, with a 
view to destroy the military depot, from whence 
the right and central division of the arm^^ under 
Generals Proctor and Vincent, drew their sup- 
plies; and the naval depot, to paralyze the effort^ 
of the British in building ships on Lake Erie. It 
was settled before the army left Sackett's Harbor, 
these objects accomplished, the division would 
sail for Niagara and operate against Fort George. 



S4 Life of Elenzer Mlieelock Ripley. 

After the reduction of that post, the army was to 
concentrate, by means of the fleet on Lake Onta- 
rio, and rednce Kingston. I will add that when 
we abandoned York, no British were, to my 
knowledge, nearer than Fort George on one side, 
and Kingston on the other. 

Yours respectfully, 

E. W. RiPLKY. 
Maj. Gkn. Dkarbokn. * Maj. Gen. U. vS. Army. 

The conduct of the American troops at York, 
as thus described by General Ripley, was in 
marked contravst with that exhibited about the 
same time In' British troops at vSan vSebastian, 
Spain. In a letter from that pknce, by the Editor 
of the New York Christian Adv^ocate, published 
January' I7th, 1889, the editor, after describing the 
capture of the forts occupied by the Frencli, writes: 

"Notwithstanding the fact that the people of 
vSan vSebastian hailed the arrival of th3 allies, the 
English soldiers, after the victor}^, obtained access 
to the wine and spirit vaults, became drunk, and 
\n\t the town to fire and sword. They robbed the 
houses, massacred the inhabitants, fearfully out- 
rao-ed women, and finallv set fire to the dwelliup;- 
houses. Women without clothes and old men 
filled with wounds fled to the mountains, and 
died of hunger. Every building in the city, ex- 
cept thirty-eight, of whichtwo were churches used' 
as hospitals, Avas burned, and all the records, civil 
and ecclesiastical, consumed. How far the offi- 
*Niles' Reg., Vol. 9, p. 160. 



Peace Establishnieiit—lS 15-1820. 85 

cers of the arni}^ were responsible has been a mat- 
ter of debate ever since. The English accounts 
say the_y did all they could to check the devasta- 
tion, but this seems incredible." 

The next ^'^ear he received orders transferr- 
ing him to the southern division, cominanded b}' 
Jackson, with his head quarters at New Orleans, 
where he arrived in January, 1817, and was re- 
ceived by a salute from Fort vSt. Charles. On 
his way to New Orleans, he visited Jackson at 
Nashville, Tennessee, who was at that time ex- 
tremely^ solicitous that Colonel Drayton of vSouth 
Carolina, should be appointed by President Mon- 
roe as vSecretary of War in the formation of his 
first cabinet. Dra^^ton had been a pronounced 
federalist and ojjponent of the party, to which 
Monroe and Jackson belonged, but when war was 
finally declared, regardless of part}- feelings, he 
enlisted in its prosecution with patriotic and un- 
faltering zeal. This, with his acknowledged abil- 
ity, attracted the notice and secured the friend- 
ship of Jackson and drew from the latter that 
memorable letter, dated November 12, 1816, 
which, man}^ 3xars afterward, was destined to 
play an important part in securing Jackson's own 
elevation to the presidenc3^ In a previous letter 
he had strongh^ urged the appointment of Dra}-- 
ton for Secretar}' of War. In this, he renewed 
his efforts in this direction, and in the course of 
it said, "vSince my last to you, in which this sub- 
ject was named. General Riplc}- has arrived here, 
who heartily concurs with me in the opinion that 



S6 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

Colonel Drayton is the best selection that can be 
made * * * * Everything depends on the selec- 
tion of your iiiinistr}^ In every selection, party 
and party feeling should be avoided. Now is the 
time to exterminate the monster called part}- 
spirit. B}^ selecting characters most conspicuous 
for their probity, virtue, capacit}^ and firmness, 
without any regard to party, you will go far to, 
if not entirely eradicate those feelings which, on 
former occasions, threw so many obstacles in the 
way of government, and perhaps have the pleas- 
ure and honor of uniting a people heretofore po- 
liticall}' divided. Tlie chief magistrate of a great 
and powerful nation, should never indulge in 
j3arty feelings." This letter subsequent!}^ enlisted 
many prominent federalists in an ardent support 
of Jackson for the presidency, but did not suc- 
ceed in convincing Monroe of the propriety of 
making the suggested appointment. He replied 
at great length and with great candor, adverting 
to the course of the federal party, to his belief 
that some of its leaders were unfriendly to our 
system of government, but that the dangerous 
purposes ascribed to some of the leaders were nev- 
er adopted, "if they were known," especially in their 
full extent, by any large portion of the federal 
party, but were confined principally to certain 
leaders, and they mostly to the eastward;" but he 
adds, "to give effect to free government, and se- 
cure it from future danger, ought not its decided 
friends, who stood firm in the da^^ of trial, be prin- 
cipally relied on?" Would not the association of 



Peace Estahlishnient-~18 15-1820. 87 

aii}^ of their opponents in the administration itself, 
wound their feelings, or at least of very many of 
them, to the injury of the republican cause?" * * * 
My impression is, that the administration should 
rest strongl3^ on the republican party, indulging 
to the other a spirit of moderation, and evincing 
a disposition to discriminate between its members, 
and to bring the "whole into the republican 
fold as quietl}^ as possible." Mr. Monroe sub- 
sequently concluded to appoint General Jackson 
himself, but refrained from doing so, upon inform- 
ation through a friend of the latter that he did 
not wish to be nominated. vSubsequently Mr. 
Calhoun was nominated and accepted. 

The correspondence between Jackson and 
Monroe remained unpublished for seven years, 
neither anticipating its publication, and when pub- 
lished it became conspicuous in the political and 
turbulent contests of the day, which extended 
during the subsequent turbulent administration 
of General Jackson as president, and afforded a 
memorable illustration that as "times change we 
change with them." 

In April, 1817, General Jackson issued an 
order to his subordinate officers not to obe}' any 
order emanating from the war department, unless 
coming through him as the organ of communica- 
tion. The president was in a strait between his 
acting secretary of war on the one hand and Gen- 
eral Jackson on the other, and did nothing, until 
finally the question was brought to an issue by 



88 Life of Bleazer Wheelock Riplej\ 

the refusal of General Riple}', in obedience to 
this order of General Jackson, refusing to obey an 
order from the war department. He promptly 
reported the facts to his superior officer. Jack- 
son at once assumed the responsibility of the act, 
and on the 14th of August wrote to the president 
justif3"ing his own conduct. 

When Mr. Calhoun came into the war depart- 
ment, he promptly decided that "on ordinar3" oc- 
casions orders from that department would issue 
only to the commanding generals of divisions, and 
in cases where the services required a different 
course, the general-in-chief would be notified of 
the order and with as little delay as possible." At 
the same time, he addressed a private letter to 
Jackson explanatory of the order and his views, 
which was highly gratifying to Jackson. The in- 
cidents here referred to indicate the militar}" re- 
lations and the good feelings that existed between 
Jackson and Ripley and which were carried by 
them into private life. 

In addition to the duties incident to his com- 
mand. General Ripley' was also employed upon 
extra service in jjrojecting and seeing to the es- 
tablishment of fortifications and to other work for 
the better securit}" of the territorj^ falling within 
the limits of his militar^^ department. 

In 1820, tired probably of the inaction incident 
to a time of peace, he resigned his commission in 
the army, and resumed the practice of his profes- 
sion in New Orleans. He soon after became in- 



Professional and Political. S9 

volved in a protracted and unpleasant controversy 
with the government, relative to the adjustment 
of his accounts, and in 1822 the government insti« 
tuted a suit against him as a defaulter. After the 
lapse of 3^ears, obtaining a decision against the 
government, the latter, by a writ of error, carried 
the case before the vSupreme Court of the United 
States, where it was tried in Januar}^ 1833, ex par-^ 
te on the part of the government. Judge McLean 
delivered the opinion of the court, and, after lay- 
ing down the principles which should govern in 
adjudicating upon the claims of the defendant, re- 
marked that "the distinginshed services rend=- 
ered by the defendant during the late war are ad- 
vantageously knowai to the country; but the claims 
set up in the case under consideration, must be 
brought within the established rules on the sub- 
ject, before they can receive judicial sanction. 
And, as in the opinion of the court, the district 
court erred in their instructions to the jury, which 
were given without qualification, the judgment 
must be reversed and tne cause remanded for 
further proceedings." 

With this decision for a guide, the case again 
came up for trial in the inferior court in 1835, when 
the jury returned a verdict in his favor for $2Q,- 
596.12. 

At the session of Congress in 1836 the char- 
acter of this prosecution w^as brought to the notice 
of the Senate by Mr. Hubbard of New^ Hampshire, 
w4io, in an able speech, exposed its injustice, and 
effected the passage of a bill directing the pa}^- 



00 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley, 

ment of a part of the amount awarded b}" the 
jury. 

These proceedings dispelled any prejudice 
remaining against his conduct as a public officer, 
but could not repair the inroads, which a keen 
sense of injury and injustice, sustained through 
so man}^ years, had made upon his health. 

After returning to the bar, he was soon en- 
gaged in an extensive practice, but at the same 
time was deepl}^ interested in developing the 
great agricultural and commercial resources of 
his adopted state by a wise and liberal system of 
internal improvements. With these feelings, he 
became a member of a Board of Commissioners of 
Internal Improvements, which was established, 
consisting of Henry Johnson, governor and ex- 
officio president of the board, E. W. Ripley, Phil. 
Thomas, Colonel Olivier, H. Bry and Jacque Vil- 
lere. As soon as the Board organized, a plan of 
operation was agreed upon and the duties of each 
member designated, embracing an examination of 
the country in which he resided. In 1826 General 
Ripley and General P. Thomas examined what 
are called the Florida Parishes, situated between 
the Mississippi and Pearl Rivers. Governor John- 
' son and General Villere examined the parishes 
composing the then first, second and fourth ju- 
dicial districts. Governor Johnson and Colonel Oli- 
vier the parishes of Attakapas and Opilousas, and 
Mr. Bry examined the north-western parishes. 
The improvemen tof the Bayou Plaquemine being 



Prolessional and Political. Dt 

considered of very great importance, was exam- 
ined by the whole Board, 

In November, 1826, the niembers met in New 
Orleans and presented in writing the results of 
their examination, agreed upon the substance and 
form of the report, and confided to General Ripley 
the duty of drawing it up, which he did, accom- 
panied by some general views calculated to awak- 
en and stimulate public interest on the subject 
of internal improvements. This report to the 
legislature, so written, was signed bj^ all the 
members, except General Villere, who was absent 
when it was presented to the Board. In enlarg- 
ing upon the subject, the commissioners said^ 
*'While, however, the commissioners are sensible 
of many defects, they have the consolation aris- 
ing from the reflection that they have made their 
greatest efforts, however humble may be its claim, 
to advance the prosperity and welfare of Louisi- 
ana. 

"The subject of internal improvements they 
deem of transcendent importance; not only the- 
present generation will feel its beneficial effects; 
but it will impart its character to future ages, and' 
posterity will hail with gratitude that legislature 
w^hich first commenced the mighty work. We 
hope and trust that it will rapidly progress. With 
the just pride of citizens of the American Repub- 
lic, we have seen the gigantic strides of some of 
our sister states. 

"New York, possessing about the same area as 



92 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley, 

-Louisiana, has the merit of taking the lead, and has 
thrown civilized Kurope in the back ^ound, by 
the boldness of her plans and the rapid it}" of their 
execution. Next to her is the young state of Ohio, 
which is now excavating a canal of more than three 
hundred miles along a tract of country", which, 
thirty years since was inhabited only by savages. 
Other states have caught the generous enthusiasm, 
and the most intense emulation has been excited in 
a cause calculated to develop all the local re- 
sources, and to advance rapidly the prosperity of 
the individual states. 

"And will Louisiana pause on a subject so in- 
teresting to her welfare? Will her citizens re- 
main in apath}", when they see the enterprise of 
New York alread}" extending its system of canals 
to the very banks of the lakes, and opening cheaj:> 
water transportation to the shores of the Hudson 
for immense regions, which heretofore have been 
considered indissolubly united with the great par- 
ent of our western rivers? Shall we slumber in 
tranquillity, when we behold the spirit of the age, 
and the enterprise that supporting and supported 
by our free constittition, is opposed by no obsta- 
cles and tired by no exertion? An enterprise that 
has already broken down the Alleghany and is, with 
rapid progress, bringing the waters of the Ohio 
and Mississippi to mingle with the Hudson. 

"Your commissioners fondly anticipate that 
the enlightened legislature of the state is thorough- 
ly awakened to the importance of this subject. 
Supported hj public opinion, we have no doubt 



Professional and Political. 93 

they will enter with energy npon the career of 
internal improvement, and impart to every sec- 
tion of Louisiana, already so advantageously 
placed, by the bounty of providence, those ame- 
liorations, which are necessary to advance her high- 
est prosperity." 

vSuch appeals were not in vain, and in the course 
of a few 3^ears, not only were large amounts ex- 
pended upon local objects, but the gigantic scheme 
of connecting New Orleans and Nashville b}^ a 
railroad was conceived and commenced. A worthy 
and patriotic spirit pervaded the people. New 
Orleans subscribed liberally to the undertaking, 
the state advanced its credit for a portion of the 
work, the coffers of individuals were generously 
opened to push on the enterprise, when the monied 
crisis of 1837 burst upon the land, and broken 
banks, universal distress and prostrated credit, 
suspended the prosecution of the work. Graduall}^ 
recovering from the effects of this sudden blow% 
w^ith confidence restored, her popiilation aug- 
mented, her agriculture flourishing, her commerce 
wonderfidly increased and expanded, the public 
mind of Louisiana again reverted to works of inter- 
nal improvements, and the state can now point to 
her splendid system of railwaj^s and her water 
communications as indicating that she has not 
been idle by the side of her sister states in the 
march of improvement and the development of 
her agricultural and commercial interests. 

In the presidential contest of 1828, between 



04 Life of Bleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

Jackson and Adams, General Riplej^ \varml3' sup- 
ported the former, his |>ersonal and political friend, 
and was the author of the address issued to the 
people of Louisiana b}'^ the democratic state con- 
vention. After glancing at the earl}^ career of the 
rival candidates and the military conduct of Jack- 
son in subduing the Creek Indians, the address 
pays a glowing tribute to his character, and closes 
with the following allusion to the duty of Louisi- 
ana: 

*'In the approaching election, Louisiana has 
a more important part to perform than any of her 
sister states. It was here that Jackson gathered 
his brightest laurels. In defense of our cit}^ and 
all its endearing relations, he displayed the . no- 
blest exertions of heroic virtue. * * * 
* * While he (Mr. Adams) was favorable 
to a stipulation in the treat}" of Ghent, to 
give to England for a limited time, the free navi- 
gation of the Mississippi, and thus afford to En- 
glish capitalists and subjects, the entire control of 
our commerce and commercial towns; General 
Jackson was hastening through trackless deserts 
to our defence. The glorious renown which we 
acquired under his auspices, is our dearest inheri- 
tance; it has made the name of Louisiana respected 
throughout the world; his fame and that of 
our fair capital are indissolubl}" connected to the 
latest posteritj". The annals of every age have 
associated the battlefields of freedom with the 
chief by whose skill and valor the bright trophy 
has been achieved. The names of Jackson and New 



I^ofessional and Political. 95 

Orleans are destined to remain united through 
every future generation. Together they will adorn 
the pages of impartial historj^; together they will 
excite the efforts of the pencil; together they will 
awaken the inspiration of the bard. And shall 
posterity say that we have been ungrateful to our 
fi-reat benefactor? No, fellow citizens, such last- 
ing disgrace will not darken the bright pages of 
our histor3^ Jackson is the choice of this state — 
the Louisianians are brave and they admire his 
valor — they are patriotic, and they respect his 
ardent love of countrj^ — they are generous and en- 
thusiastic, and they will evince their heart-felt 
srratitude to the savior of the state." 

The whole address, pervaded with the spirit 
of the preceding extract, was unanimously adopt- 
ed as was also a resolution presenting the thanks 
of the convention ''to General Ripley, and the 
committee, for the able and eloquent address 
which the convention has adopted." Six thousand 
copies of the address and the proceedings of the 
convention were ordered published, half in French 
and half in English. The convention consisted of 
some of the most distinguished citizens of Louisi- 
ana, conspicuous for many years, in the history of 
the state, and was presided over by Bernard 
Marigny, a name so well known throughout the val- 
ley of the Mississippi, during the first half of the 
century. 

At this time, New Orleans, through its press 
and the spirit of its inhabitants, and through com- 



06 Life of Eleazer IFhcelock Ripley. 

mercial relations, exerted great influence over all 
the vast region watered by the Mississippi river 
and its tributaries. The recollection of common 
achievements in subduing Indian atrocities and 
in conquering British invaders, was a chord which, 
when once touched, vibrated in sj^mpathy upon 
the hearts of the western people. The address of 
the Louisiana convention, reflected this feeling 
and aroused it to action. It swept along with re- 
sistless might, and the magnetic influence, the 
personal popularit}^ and the zealous efforts of 
the imperious Clay, were unable to stay its prog- 
ress, but sank before it, and in the election that 
followed, not onl}^ Louisiana, but all the states 
west of the AUeghanies, gave their undivided elec- 
toral votes to Jackson, who was elected president 
over John Ouincy Adams by one hundred and 
seventy-eight, to eighty-three electoral votes. At 
the next presidential election, Clay himself being 
the candidate in opposition to Jackson, whose 
bank policy had been the object of bitter and vio- 
lent attack, fared no better than Adams, and was 
beaten by a vote of 219 to 49, although he suc- 
ceeded in securing the vote of Kentucky. 

General Ripley subsequentl}" removed to the 
parish of East Feliciana, and represented the sen- 
atorial district, composed of that and the parish 
of West Feliciana, in the state senate, during the 
session of 1832. The pages of the Senate Journal 
for this session bear testimony to the energy of 
his character, the spirit of his principles and his 
assiduity in the discharge of his public duties. 



Professional and Political. 97 

Among the important questions that agitated the 
senate at this time was one to pledge the faith of 
the state in favor of the Union Bank of Louisiana, 
and another, was a resokition instructing the 
members of Congress from the state, to vote in 
favor of the re-charter of the Bank of the United 
States. He was opposed to both propositions. 

The condition of that numerous class, which 
is employed upon our western waters and the 
diseases and misfortunes to which they are ex- 
posed, had enlisted his sympathies and made him 
anxious to devise measures for their comfort. 
For this purpose he introduced a resolution, with 
a view to memorializing Congress to establish a 
marine hospital on the western waters. 

Ainong the pleasing duties which devolved 
upon him at this session, was that of presenting, 
as chairman of the committee, a resolution express- 
ing the gratitude of the state, to Edward Livings- 
ton, for the criminal code compiled by him, and 
directing the donation to him of a gold medal. 
For this eminent citizen, General Ripley enter- 
tained profound friendship and respect and 
had been one of the most active and influen- 
tial persons in securing Livingston's election 
to the United States Senate in 1829. Livingston 
at this period had become one of the most eminent 
of American statesmen, philanthropists and ju- 
rists. 

In addition to his civil services, Livingston 
had acquired a strong hold upon the affec- 



08 Life of Eleazer IVheelock Ripley. 

tioas of the people of Louisiana, b}^ the efficient 
and vahiable aid he rendered in repelling the Brit- 
ish invaders of her soil in 1815. 

Belonging- to the same political part^^ and an- 
imated by a like high sense of honor, Jackson and 
Livingston, colleagues in Congress, towards the 
close of the last century, had, during their con- 
gressional service, formed a mutual attachment 
that remained unbroken during subsequent 3'ears. 
When the former as militar}'^ commander, rushed 
to the defence of New Orleans, he found Livings- 
ton animated with a stern spirit of resistance and 
ready as vohtnteer aid to render all possible assis- 
tance. This proved so valuable, that he received 
the most gratifying commendations fn^m his he- 
roic chief. With such claims upon the gratitude 
of the state. General Riple}" was drawn to the sup- 
port of Livingston for the United States Senate 
in 1829, by the similarity of their political views 
and the confidence he felt in the wise influence 
which Livingston could exert at Washington. 

Hence he became warmly enlisted in the suc- 
cessful movement to send Livingston to the Sen- 
ate, which result, combined with Jackson's per- 
sonal friendship, doubtless led soon after, in 1831, 
to the transfer of Livingston from the Senate to 
the President's Cabinet as vSecretary of State. 
The President had fully tested his patriotism, his 
zeal, and his ability in their personal and political 
relations in Congress, and in military operations; 
he now felt that he could safelj" confide in the 



J^rofessional and Politital. 99 

prudence and patriotism of Livingston as an ad- 
viser, amid the storms which threatened his ad- 
ministration. Of the wisdom that prompted this 
exchange from the Senate to the Cabinet, Ban- 
croft, the historian, saj^s: 

"The salvation of the country turned on tlie 
right interpretation of the principles of democ- 
racy. Jefferson, its early leader, was no more, but 
Madison lived long enough to expound its acts 
and resolutions of former days; and Jackson as 
President of the United vStates, having Livingston 
as his adviser, gave authority to that exposition. 
Who that looks back upon those days does not 
rejoice that the chief magistrate was Jackson, and 
that his adviser was Edward Livingston, who to 
the clearest perceptions and the finest purpose 
added a calm, conciliating benignity and the ven- 
erableness of age, enhanced by a world-wide fame." 

As vSecretary of State, Livingston drew the 
draft of that memorable Nullification Proclama- 
tion of Jackson, in December, 1832, which placed 
that grand seal of reprobation upon the conduct 
of South Carolina and her doctrine of the right of 
secession. It also indicated not only the calm 
judgment, the fixed determination, and undying 
loyalty to the Union of the president, but also a 
fuller and more complete exposition of the utter- 
ances of Livingston in Congress, on the 21st of 
June, 1798, on the alien and sedition laws. 

Strong as was the popular feeling in favor of 
electing Livingston to the Senate, an unexpected 
L.ofC. 



100 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

opposition sprang up from some local questions 
in which the people of the Florida Parishes were 
deeply interested and which threatened to prove 
serious to the friends of Livingston, unless re- 
moved. This was happil^^ accomplished through 
the intervention of General Kiple}^ upon whose 
suggestion, Honorable Cade D. Strickland, a mem- 
ber of the legislature from those parishes, ad- 
dressed a letter to Livingston, who gave a re- 
sponse that proved satisfactory. In this he ex- 
plained not only what course ought to be taken in 
justice to all parties as to the local matters re- 
ferred to, but also expressed the opinion that 
senators should be governed by the instructions 
of the general assembly of the state which they 
represent. 



CHAPTER III. 

In 1832, General Ripley was a candidate for 
Congress in the second congressional district of 
Ivonisiana which lay east of the Mississippi river, 
but was defeated by a small majority. He was 
returned, however, at the next election in 1834, as 
a member of the 24th Congress and was re-elected 
in 1836, by an overwhelming and most flattering 
majority. 

When a candidate, his views v^ere fully ex- 
plained upon the various political questions which 
at that period agitated the public mind, and which 
for a long time continued to occvipy and divide 
public opinion. He clearly and emphatically con- 
demned the doctrine of nullification, was hostile 
to the incorporation of a national bank as unau- 
thorized by the constitution, took early and 
advanced ground in favor of donating the public 
land to actual settlers, and advocated the consti- 
tutionality of the Tariff of 1828, although favoring 
its modification, and gave his views upon the 
question of Internal Improvements. 

In 1831, when a candidate for the state senate, 
the substance of the queries propounded to him 
embraced three distinct subjects: 1st, the revenue 
laws of the country as embodied in the Tariff of 
1828; 2d, the power of Congress to appropriate 
money for Internal Improvements; 3d, the con- 



102 Life of Eleazer IVheelock Ripley. 

stitutional power of Congress to incorporate a 
national bank. 

In a speech delivered in April, 1831, and pub- 
lished m connection with a letter dated October, 
1831, he fnlly and frankly answered these ques- 
tions. He treated the Tariff in two aspects: 1st, 
its constitutionality; 2d, its expedienc3^ In the 
discussion of the first head, he said: "By the pres- 
ent constitution, the people of the different states 
have, by a mutual compact, parted with a portion 
of the state sovereign t}^ and vested it, without an'}' 
provision for its recall, in a national government. 
The states, then, had their general sovereignty 
limited b}^ the powers delegated to the general 
government, while the national government, on 
the contrary, has its powers limited by the very 
enumeration of powers contained in the Constitu- 
tion of the United vStates, and particularl}^ by the 
Articles of Amendment. But both sover- 
eignties, thus limited, derive their powers from 
the same source, to wit: the people of the sever- 
al states. They have seen fit, instead of imj^art- 
ing them to one government, either of the state 
or the United States, to divide them, to commit 
certain powers with their necessary attributes to 
the national government, and deprive the states 
of them, and to retain the residue to the states re- 
spectively. Thus in fact, rendering neither of 
these governments the possessor of the whole at- 
tributes of sovereignty; but only in part. The}^ 
possessed the power to modify their social com- 
pact as the}^ pleased. They could have done away 



J^rofessional and Political. 103 

with a national or state government entirely, if they 
had thought proper. They are the source of all 
legitimate power, possessing the right to build up 
the social edifice with what dimensions they 
please. 

"The real structure of our form of government, 
then, appears to me to be this: that the people 
have determined to divest the states of specific 
attributes of sovereignt}^, vesting them in a nation- 
al government, and they have gone further, and 
in certain enumerated cases, have prohibited the 
exercise of certain enumerated powers to the 
states respective!}". The national government 
then, derives its existence from the same source 
which the state governments do — the compact of 
the people of the states. It is within the limits of 
its sovereignty as purel}" pojoular in its origin as 
the state government — resting on a similar basis, 
that of its having been enacted by ''We the people 
of the United States." 

A.fter enlarging upon this point and quoting 
the Articles of the Constitution, which sfive Con- 
gress the exclusive right of laying and collecting 
taxes, duties, imposts and excises, and to regulate 
commerce with foreign nations and among the 
several states and with the Indian tribes, he says: 
"When I examine the tariff of 1828, I find it an 
act to la}" duties on certain imports and that the 
sole provisions relate to duties aud imposts upon 
articles of merchandise imported into the United 
States. I am therefore brought irresistablj" to the 
conclusion that the act is within the limits of the 



104 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

power delegated to Congress and is therefore con- 
stitutional." * * * * "The other text of 
the constitution, the power to regulate commerce 
with foreign nations is equally comprehensive. 
That power is a sovereign power, which the people 
of the United States have vested in Congress. 
Its meaning is, that the whole mode by which our 
interchange of commodities to be carried on with 
foreign nations shall be vested in the government 
of the United vStates. This power is always car- 
ried into effect in such a manner as shall most con- 
duce to the interest of the nation adopting a par- 
ticular system. In our system, we have resorted 
to many changes at different epochs of our history, 
according to our peculiar wants. * * * * 
After the adoption of the constitution, it became 
evident that unless we imposed high duties upon 
foreign vessels. Great Britain from her superior 
skill at that time, from the cheapness of her labor, 
and from the amount of her capital, would under- 
bid our ship-owners in our own ports for freight, 
and thus monopolize the whole carrying trade of 
the United States. This lead Congress in 1789 to 
impose tonnage duty on foreign vessels eight 
times greater than on American ships, and, in ad- 
dition, to lay ten percent extra duties on merchan- 
dize imported in them, in order to protect the 
industry of our citizens as applied to navigation, 
and imder the auspices of these fostering pro- 
visions of navigation, naval forces have grown up 
until they have arrived at a point where they can 



Professional and Political. 105 

proudly and gallantly enter the lists with all na- 
tions, either in peace or war." 

As to the expediency of that tariff, he con- 
cluded as follows; 

"The advocates of the tariff as well as the 
nullifiers in my opinion, ought to reflect upon the 
w^ound which at this moment is being inflicted 
upon the relations of the Union. The southern 
planters feel that the duties on hemp, iron and 
w^oolens are high, and that they operate, as an op- 
pressive tax upon these articles of first necessity 
to the agricultural interests of the South. Now 
let the advocates of the tariff consent to its modi- 
fication. There is no legislation which so rouses 
the feelings of every American freeman, as an 
onerous tax. The^^ will make any sacrifice if their 
countrj^ is invaded — they suffer privation in 
its defense without a murmur. But if a tax 
be imposed, which they conscientiously be- 
lieve oppressive, all the indignant feelings of 
freemen swell in their bosoms. Those feelings 
are honorable; sometimes they may be misdi- 
rected; but they are sentiments interwoven wath 
our very existence, and have taught us to resist 
aggression from whatever quarter it may come. 

"Let the advocates of the tariff respect these 
feelings, and do not attempt ungenerously, be- 
cause in a majority, to force oppressive duties on 
the whole south, to build up their own manufac- 
turing interests; let them consent to a moderate 
reduction of the tariff of 1828, on articles of ne- 



106 Life of ElcRZer Wheelock Ripley. 

cessit^', and even' discordant feeling will be al- 
la3'ed. On the other hand, I do hope that the 
doctrine of nnllili.cation will no longer be heard 
in the land. It is a doctrine which I view as 
menacing with the niOvSt deadly calamity that 
Union, under which we have so long prospered, 
and which is so interwoven with all the proud as- 
sociations of American history. Let ns exercise 
our constitutional rights, in petitions to Congress, 
armed with the force of public opinion, to obtain 
a modification of the obnoxious duties, but let us 
abstain from all menaces which are directed at 
the principles of the National Constitution." 

Upon the subject of Internal Improvements, 
he avowed his belief that Congress had the power 
to make military roads, remarking that "it must 
occur to every candid politician of every party, 
that the national government, entrusted with the 
power of peace and war, authorized to raise armies 
and build forts, has the necessary power of con- 
structing military roads so as to svipplj^ them with 
arms, food and clothing." He was also inclined to 
the opinion that Congress "had the power to make 
post roads, as the constitution expressl}" granted 
the power to establish post offices and post 
roads," that upon consulting dictionaries, he found 
the word establish to mean to build upon, to 
found, to create, to nial^e, that to nials^e was the 
construction placed upon the word by Mr. Lowndes 
of South Carolina and by Mr. Livingston of Louisi- 
ana. 

LTpon the head of improving navigable rivers, 



Professional mid Political. 107 

he argued that, under the constitution, Congress 
had the power to regulate commerce with foreign 
nations and with the different states, and in the exer- 
cise of this power had established custom houses 
on navigable waters, had required all vessels nav- 
igating them of ten tons btirden or upwards, to 
pay duties for an annual license, and had assumed 
this jurisdiction over the navigable river courses 
of the United States ever since the adoption of 
the constitution. That the question raised as to 
the power of Congress to levy a tax upon the citi- 
zens of a state for the privilege of navigating a 
river within the state would be more difficult to 
decide, 3^et he must be a strong advocate for 
state rights, who would contend that Congress has 
power over a river, to lay a tax and yet could 
not appropriate a part of that tax to improve that 
very river." It appeared to him he said: "that 
if we on the Mississippi are compelled to pay 
this tax, that it is equall}^ constitutional for Con- 
gress to expend it in improving the river, the nav- 
igation on which it is levied." 

These, he adds, "are the only cases, where I 
believe Congress has the power, which are gen- 
erall}^ termed Internal Improvements, within the 
limits of a state; and I consider every one as de- 
ducible from the powers granted in the constitu- 
tion. The people of the states have given these 
powers, and the people only have a right to take 
them away. They have been consecrated b}^ the 
usages of every administration, and I conscien- 



108 Life of Eleazer Wheeiock Ripley. 

tiotisly think have been granted b}" the people of 
the states to the national government. 

"The various other projects of cutting canals, 
making national roads, I believe to be constitu- 
tional, only so far as they are actually necessary 
as military roads, or as post roads; or are projects 
for improving navigable water courses, where 
government collects a duty on vessels of ten tons 
and upwards." 

A.S to an United States Bank, he said, "Many 
men of high character and whose opinions are en- 
titled to weight, differ from myself on the subject, 
and I know that my sentiments are in direct op- 
position to a decision of that high tribunal, the Su- 
preme Court of the United States. 

"In 1811, the question of renewal of the old 
bank of the United vStates, if I recollect correctl}^, 
was discussed in the legislature of a sister state, 
of which I was then a member. It was introduced 
in conseqvience of a resolution offered to instruct 
the senators and representatives of the state in 
Congress to vote against the renewal of the old 
bank, on the ground it was unconstitutional. This 
resolution I voted for. I thought that the charter 
of the bank was unconstitutional, not from any hos- 
tilit}^ to the institution, but I was of opinion that 
Congress had no power to establish a national 
bank given to them by the people. No such 
power is enumerated; and it strikes me that it 
would be a forced construction, to say that it was 
necessary to carr}^ into effect the enumerated 



ProfessioiiRl and Political. 109 

powers, I have had no reason to change this opin« 
ion. On the contrarj^, tlie fact that Mr. Jeiferson 
mentions that in the original draft of the consti- 
tution, there was such a power given which was 
stricken out (in order to render tlie constitution 
palatable to Pennsylvania, where there were 
strong prejudices against banking) convinces me 
that there does not exist an}^ power in Congress to 
incorporate a national bank oxit of the District of 
Columbia." 

When a candidate in 1834, he was again ap- 
proached with a multitude of questions, embrac- 
ing not only the topics already answered in 1831, 
but involving the nicest and most metaphysical 
doctrines growing out of the constitutional rela- 
tions of the states to the general government. 

In his reply, he dwelt with apparent pleasure 
upon the confirmation which his views, advanced 
in 1831, had subsequently received from the action 
of the president, by his memorable nullification 
proclamation, by his veto of the Maysville Road 
Bill, b}^ the popular condemnation of the re-charter 
of the United States Bank, and by the re-adjust- 
ment of the tariff effected under the leadership of 
Henry Clay, b}^ the Compromise Act of 1832-33. 

In commenting upon the tariff, he said: "I do 
not think it policy to force a factory system by 
any other protection than that which is incident to 
raising a revenue. To place thousands of our 
young men and women as laborers in the walls of 
a factory; to subject them to the caprice of one or 



110 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

two capitalists and dependent on their nod for 
dail}" wag'es, would rear up, in the manufacturing- 
districts, a dependent race of being-s, and nourish 
a state of society which, like that of England, will 
form the germ of aristocracy and pauperism. 

Far better would it be for our free institutions 
to give awa}" our public lands to rising genera- 
tions for the mere cost of surveying (perhaps ten 
cents an acre) in half sections to families, and 
quarter sections to unmarried men, on condition 
of settlement, than to rear them up dependent 
beings within the walls of a factor3^ If we thus 
dispose of the public lands, they being no longer 
available funds to the treasary; the present grad- 
ual reduction would probably not more than meet 
the frugal expenditures of the country for many 
years to come. 

How much more salutarj^ would such a course 
be, than a forced wS3"stem of protection to factories. 
If the public lands were to be granted to actual 
settlers in convenient tracts, the whole valley of 
the Mississippi would, before long, teem with a 
prosperous and industrious population, owning 
the lands on which the}" were settled. A squatter 
on the public lands would be unknown, for he 
would be converted into the 2:)roprietor of the 
soil. His industry would be directed to schools, 
roads and those social relations which mark the 
independent freeman. And if the time ever ar- 
rives when liberty, with all her blessings, should 
be chased from our cities by venality and corrup- 



J^rofessional and Political. HI 

tion, she would fall back upon her natural protect- 
ors, the brave and hardy j^eomanry of the land, 
where her altars would be secure." 

In replying to other questions, his opinions 
are developed by the following extracts with ref- 
erence to nullification. 

"My conclusions, therefore, are that there is 
no constitutional remed}^ against a law passed by 
Congress, excepting those pointed out and enu- 
merated above; to wit: instructions, remonstrance, 
the checks provided in passing the law that shoiild 
be sanctioned by the House of Representatives^ — 
pass the Senate — be approved by the president-— 
expounded by the vSupreme Court — and at last be 
confirmed by a majority of the jjeople of the 
states; by the ballot box at another election; and 
finally the right of amendment and impeachment. 

"But say the advocates of nullification, the 
majority of the people will become corrupt and 
oppress the minorit}^ To this I answer, the ma- 
jority in a single state may become corrupt and 
oppress the minority in their legislation. They 
may be corrupt in the very act of nullification. 

"This argument deduced by the advocates of 
nullification proves too much, if it proves any- 
thing. It is at war with the very principles of 
free government. Despots have said that the 
people would be corrupt and incapable of gov- 
erning themselves, and that a free government 
would degenerate into a tyranny. 

"The advocates of free government, on the 



112 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley, 

other hand, have alleged that the majority of the 
people were honest, and properly educated in our 
system of government, they would not wish to 
oppress their fellow men. 

"The history of our countrv^ has so far evinced 
that they are capable and willing to correct all 
abuses. They have invariably so acted during 
our brief but glorious career. It does appear to 
me that it is a poor compliment to the cause for 
which our fathers shed their blood, that a small 
minority should denounce the vast majoritj^ of the 
people of the United vStates as having already be- 
come corrupt and degenerate. ***** 

*Tt will be perceived in all the views that I 
have taken of the subject, I have confined myself 
to the powers and remedies presented by the con- 
stittition. 

"There is an extra constitvitional power inherent 
in freemen, and that is never transferred to any 
government, whether national or state. This is 
the right to resist oppression whenever the major- 
ity become corrupt and tyrannical over their fel- 
low men. This was the right which our fathers 
had, to declare this country independent of Great 
Britain. When all modes of redress are unavail- 
ing, if the majority of the states play the tyrant 
and violate the constitution; the minority in favor 
of their unalienable rights — the rights of freemen 
— can resist tyrannj^ from whatever quarter it 
may come. As our fathers of the Revolution did, 
they can spread their banner of liberty to the 



Professional and Political. 113 

breeze, and resolve to conquer or die. This is the 
right, which nature and nation's God have im- 
parted to man. But may centuries roll by and 
numberless ages pass by, before our Union shall 
in this way perish amidst the corruption and op- 
pression of a degenerate posterity." * * * 

"But after the Supreme Court have made their 
decision, it appears to me there is another power 
which is superior to it, which is the people of the 
different states, acting through their legislatures 
and by declarator}^ amendments to the constitu- 
tion, deciding what its construction should be. * 
* * * * Laws cannot retroact because they 
are prohibited by the constitution from so doing, 
but it is in the power of the people through the 
action of their state legislatures in their elementary 
sovereignty^ I conceive to pass rules of interpret 
tation of the constitution which can act upon cases 
already decided by the Supreme Court, provided 
the majority of the states, required by the consti- 
tution, concur in the amendment. This power 
then, with the power reserved of impeachment, 
would be the power of the people to act as the 
ultimate arbiter to settle any doubtful constitu- 
tional question." 

General Ripley was governed by a broad and 
comprehensive policy with regard to the disposi- 
tion of the public lands as indicated by his posi- 
tion upon the subject when a candidate for Con- 
gress in 1834. President Jackson had already, in 
his fourth annual message in December, 1832, 



114 Life of Eleazer IVheelock Ripley. 

called the attention of Congress to the subject and 
expressed the opinion that it was best to abandon 
the idea of realizing a revenue out of the public 
lands and that they should be sold to actual set- 
tlers at a price barely sufficient to reimburse the 
United States, the expense of the land system and 
the cost arising under Indian compacts. 

To this proposition, as enlarged upon and advo- 
cated by himself, he yielded the strongest support 
In it we discover the germ of our present liberal 
Homestead law with its magnificent results, at- 
tained not by a prompt and immediate congress- 
ional recognition, but by a gradual advance; b}-^ 
the adoption of a pre-emption bill, of a bill grad- 
uating the price of public lands, and at last by the 
enactment of the present Homestead laws. The 
latter were widely discussed before the people and 
occupied the attention of Congress at several ses- 
sions, but did not materialize into a law until May 
20, 1862, after the accession of Lincoln to the pres- 
idency. A protracted and earnest contest over 
the subject had engaged the 36th Congress, which 
convened in December, 1859. On the 8th of that 
month Andrew Johnson of Tennessee gave notice 
of his intention to introduce a bill upon the sub- 
ject, which he accordingly did on the twentieth of 
the month. A bill for a like purpose was also in- 
troduced into the House, was passed and sent to 
the Senate. The two bodies being at last brought 
into agreement as to the provisions of the law, it 
was finally passed, the vote in the Senate being 
forty-four to eight, indicating the non-partizan and 



Bank Struggle — Its Outcome. 115 

non-sectional character of the measure. At that 
time the Senate stood 37 democrats, 24 republicans, 
2 members of the native American party and three 
vacancies. The House had 109 republicans, 101 
democrats, 1 whig and 26 of the native American 
party, the latter being largely from the Southern 
States. President Buchanan, however, refused to 
approve the bill on the ground of unconstitution- 
ality and of injustice to some of the states, and the 
Senate refused to pass it over his veto by a vote 
of 27 to 18, not being the two-thirds vote required 
by the constitution to over-ride a veto. 

The constitutionality and the expediency of a 
United States Bank, clothed with the attributes 
given to it at its first and second institution, 
proved the subject of warm and animated dis- 
cussion from the foundation of the government 
until its final overthrow in the contest, waged 
against it by the firm and inflexible Jackson. Of 
this contest Mr. Blaine wrote sixty years after- 
ward in his great work published in 1884. "The 
Bank of the United States in 1816 had a capital of 
thirty-five million of dollars. If a similar insti- 
tution were established to-day, bearing a like 
proportion to the wealth of the country, it would 
require a capital of at least six hundred millions 
of dollars — many folds larger than the combined 
wealth of the Bank of England and the Bank of 
France. It is hardly conceivable that such a 
power as this, could ever be entrusted to the man- 
agement of a secretary of the treasury or to a 
single board of directors with the temptations 



116 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

which would beset them. It is the contemplation of 
such an enormous power, placed in the hands of 
any body of men, that gives a more correct ap- 
preciation of the conduct and motives of General 
Jackson in his determined contest with the United 
States Bank. His instincts were correct. He saw 
that such an institution, increasing with the growth 
of the country, would surel}^ tend to corruption, 
and by its unlimited power would interfere with 
the just libert}^ of the people." 

In this determined contest, General Ripley 
was on the side of Jackson and without weighing 
either its advantages or the disadvantages of the 
institution, his personal convictions, imbibed in 
early life and remaining unchanged during subse- 
quent years, left him no other alternative to pursue. 
The contest was not only determined but became 
embittered by the most bitter and envenomed 
political attacks upon Jackson — the results to fol- 
low the defeat of the bank were portrayed in the 
most gloomy colors — the commercial world was 
convulsed by a dread picture of ruin in the event 
of Jackson's failure to p3rmit a re-charter — the 
whig leaders were animated b}^ a common spirit 
to listen to no compromise, unconditional surrender 
to their demands, would only suffice, and, amid 
panic and commercial disasters, fondlj^ anticipated 
the discomfiture of Jackson and their own return 
to the administration of the government. Had it 
not been for this overweening confidence and be- 
lief of certain victory, probably a satisfactory ar- 
ranaement between the bank officials and the 



Bank struggle — Its Outcome. 117 

president would have been effected, and mncli 
subsequent commercial distress avoided. But 
Claj^ and Webster would listen to nothing of the 
kind — they had determined upon their course, 
and bank officials received significant intimations 
■of their displeasure, if they infringed upon their 
plans. Having become the leaders in the cham- 
pionship of the re-charter, with a powerful and 
compact party obsequious to their will, and di- 
recting their attacks with their accustomed ability, 
they were finally overwhelmed with defeat, and to 
what extent tlie}^ were responsible for the bank- 
ruptcies, commercial stagnation and wide-spread 
ruin of that period, then so bitterlj^ charged upon 
Jackson, can now be more accuratel3" determined, 
at the expiration of half a century, by the light of 
recent political developments. Thurlojv Weed, 
so long potent in New York politics, the personal 
and political friend of the two whig chieftains, in 
his auto-biography, which appeared in 1883, thus 
draws the curtain and lets in the light upon, as he 
styles it, "A secret of the bank parlor." 

"vShortly before the bank applied to Congress 
for a re-charter, the Hon. Louis McLane, then 
secretary of the treasury, invited Mr. Biddle, the 
president of the United vStates Bank, to Washing- 
ton. At their, interview, the secretary informed 
Mr. Biddle that he was authorized by the presi- 
dent to say, that if the proposed re-charter of the 
bank contained certain modifications, which, Mr. 
McLane handed to Mr. Biddle, in writing, the bill 



118 Life of Eleazer IVheelock Ripley. 

would be approved. Mr. Biddle returned to Phil- 
adelphia aud submitted the proposed modifica- 
tions to Mr. John Sargent, a director of the bank 
and its counsel, and to one or two other confiden- 
tial directors, by each of whom the modifications 
were accepted. But before announcing such ac- 
quiescence to the secretary of the treasury, it was 
deemed proper to confer with leading friends 
of the bank then in Congress. Mr. Biddle and 
Mr. Sargent therefore called upon Messrs Clay 
and Webster, and submitted to these gentlemen 
the modifications required to secure the approval 
of the president, of the re-charter of the bank. 

"After much discussion and consideration, 
Messrs Clay and Webster came to the conclusion 
that the question of a re-charter of the bank had 
progressed too far and assumed aspects too de- 
cided in the public mind and in Congress to ren- 
der any compromise or change of front expedient 
or desirable. Messrs Biddle and Sargent retired 
for consideration, but returned in the evening of 
the same day, confirmed in their conviction that 
it was wise to accept the offer of the secretary of 
the treasury. Messrs Clay and Webster replied 
that they had borne the brunt of the battle so far, and 
that W\^j were confident of their ability to carry a 
bill through Congress, re-chartering the bank, even 
thotigh the bill should encounter a presidental 
veto; but that they could not be responsible for 
the result, if in the heat of the contest, the bank, 
abandoning its reliable friends, should strike 
hands with its foes." 



Twent}r-fourth Congress— 1820-1839. IW 

The great whig leaders played and lost in 
the fierce bank struggle, but time softens or dispels 
the asperities of party contest. The obloquy and 
vituperation, poured upon the firm and patriotic 
Jackson, at the time, by his ambitious and bitter ri- 
vals and opponents, have disappeared before the 
popular verdict of that day, and now Jackson figures 
in the history of that eventful and excited period 
and bitter controversy, as governed by patriotic 
motives, far seeing sagacity and "correct instincts.'^ 

During the first session of the 24th Congress, 
which convened in December, 1835, and to which 
he had been elected, General Ripley applied him- 
self to efforts to accomplish his early wishes for 
the erection of hospitals upon the western waters, 
a subject to which his attention had been drawn 
and in which he took a deep interest, while a mem- 
ber of the state senate in 1831. For this purpose 
he moved an amendment to the general appropri- 
ation bill, by which $200,000 should be applied 
under the direction of the secretary of the treasu- 
ry, in the selection of sites and preparing the 
necessary material. This amendment was re- 
jected, and in a few days he introduced a resoki- 
tion instructing the committee on roads and 
canals to report upon the expediency of establish- 
ing hospitals on the western rivers and lakes for 
disabled and sick seamen and boatmen. He was 
unable to procure immediate legislation such as 
he desired, upon the subject, but an impulse was 
given to its consideration, which in a few years 



120 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

g'ave gratifj'in^ fruit, by the establishment of the 
desired hospitals. 

The disposition to be made of the public rev- 
enue and of the larg'e surplus anticipated for the 
future, pressed upon and occupied the attention of 
Congress at this session. In his annual message, 
the president announced that the public debt was 
extinct, or money was on deposit for this purpose, 
whenever the creditors should demand it, and that 
after making all the appropriations for which es- 
timates would be submitted by the different de- 
partments and deducting unexpended appropria- 
tions already made, a surplus would probably 
remain, at the end of the year, of not less than six 
million of dollars. IvCgislation and the conse- 
quences growing out of it, unexpected by the jires- 
ident, actuall}^ swelled this surpUis to some forty 
millions of dollars. Congress at this session 
passed a law requiring all the surplus in excess 
of five millions of dollars distributed among the 
states in quarterly installments, to be repaid when 
Congress should require it. In terms it was a 
loan, in reality its ardent supporters had so framed 
the law for the purpose of overcoming ?a\\ con- 
stitutional scruples which the president would 
entertain against a direct gift to the states, without 
the least expectation that repayment would ever 
be demanded. Under the operation of the law 
three installments, amounting to twent3"-eiglit mil- 
lions of dollars, were distributed among the 
states, when the fourth installment was arrested by 
the intervention of Congress, owing to the finan- 



Distribution of Public Revenue. 121 

cial needs of the government and the threatening 
aspects of monetary matters. 

No sooner had the law passed and the public 
revenue in large amounts found its way into the 
vaults of the state banks, as its selected custodians 
either by the states or the general government, 
than this revenue became the basis for a vast ex- 
pansion of paper currency, stimulated the creation 
of new banks, overspread the country with a spirit 
of wild and intemperate speculation and culmi- 
nated in what is known as the disastrous commer- 
cial panic of 1837.. 

The public lands were the incentive and po- 
tent factor in producing ths wida-spread ruin that 
followed. General Ripley apprehending danger 
from this quarter, attempted to guard against it, 
and to secure the public domain from the grasp 
of the speculator, and for this object, when the 
bill was before the House, on the 21st of June, he 
proposed several additional sections to it, "pro- 
viding that no public lands should be sold ex- 
cept to actual settlers, for the term of five years." 

His efforts, however, were futile, but the vast 
importance of the amendment, which he proposed, 
greater probably than he then realized, was inWy 
verified in the course of a few months. The sense 
of impending danger and public calamity impelled 
the president, soon after the adjournment of Con- 
gress, to direct the secretary of the treasury to 
issue an order requiring that future payment for 
the public lands, should be made in specie, ex- 



122 Life of Bleazer IVheelock Ripley. 

ceptiiig' sales made ta actual settlers prior to the 
15th of Deceinber, 183G. 

This order, known as "the specie circular," 
immediatel}^ becani3 the object of the fiercest at^ 
tacks from the enemies of the president, but the 
reasons assigned for it seem most fully to justify 
his course. 

In connection w'ith it, he says, in his messag'e, 
in December, 1836, describing' the operations of 
the banks, land offices and speculators: 

**The banks lent out their notes to speculators; 
they were paid to the receivers, and immediately 
returned to the banks to be lent out again and 
again, being mere instruments to transfer to spec- 
ulators the inDst valuable public land, and pay the 
governmant b}^ a credit on the book of the banks. 
Those credits on the books of soma of the western 
banks, usually called deposits, were already greatly 
beyond their immediate means of payment, and 
were rapidly increasing. Indeed, each specula- 
tion furnished means for another; for no sooner 
had one individual or company paid in the notes^ 
than the}^ were immediately lent to another for a 
like purpose; and the banks were extending their 
business and their issues so largely, as to alarm 
considerate men, and render it doubtful whether 
these bank credits, if permitted to accumulate, 
would ultimately be of the least value to the 
government. The spirit of expansion and specu- 
lation was not confined to deposit banks, but 
pervaded the whole multitude of banks through- 



Public Lands. 123 

out tlie Union, and was giving rise to new institu- 
tions to aggravate the evil." 

In proposing his amendments to the bill, Gen, 
Kiple}^ was probably governed by two motives, 
one, his favorite policy long before expressed 
of reserving the public lands for actual settlers, 
and the other the fear of injuriously affecting, the 
monetary and industrial interests of the country, 
by engendering a wild spirit of speculation. With- 
out his amendment, the bill seemed the best at 
that time, attainable for the safety of the public 
revenue and the benefit of the people, and he 
voted for it. Upon its final passage in the 
House, it received one hundred and fifty five 
votes, with thirty-eight against it. In the Senate 
it had received thirty-nine votes to six against, 
and was approved by the President. 

Soon after taking his seat in congress he was 
terribly shocked by the death of his only son who 
serving under Colonel Fanning, in Texas, was one 
of the 560 men, who were inhumanly shot by 
order of Santa Anna, the Mexican general, in 
utter disregard of the terms of capitulation. 
Exasperated by such perfidity and inhuman- 
ity, the feelings of the father became thoroughly 
enlisted in the cause for which his son died, 
and he watched with intense interest the Texan 
struggle for independence. The contest of arms 
was not of long duration and was followed by 
that of diplomacy, which lasted beyond the life of 
General Ripley. 



124 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

At this session the slavery question became 
prominent, and those foremost in the advocacy 
and maintenance of the right of petition and in 
encourag-ing the then so called abolition party in 
converting the national forum into a political con- 
duit for the propagation of their sentiments, was 
ex-president John Q. Adams, who, perhaps smart- 
ing under his defeat as presidential candidate in 
1828, entered Congress in 1831, as representative 
of the district in Massachusetts in which he re- 
sided. Of the character of the class of petitioners 
with which he was so ready and active in agitat- 
ing the bod}- to which he belonged and in contrib- 
uting to public excitement, he records in his pri- 
vate diar}^ that on the 7th of January, 1839, he 
presented ninety-five petitions bearing upon 
slavery topics and that some of them were ''very 
exasperating in their language." 

In his past official life he had, as a member 
of Mr. Monroe's cabinet, opposed the treaty nego- 
tiated by Mr. Rush, in 1824 for the more effectual 
suppression of the African slave trade, for the 
ratification of which Mr. Monroe was anxious; as 
Secretary of State he had given his best aid to the 
acquisition of Florida, a slave territory, subse- 
quently to be made a slave state, and it was uni- 
versally understood that he was opposed to the 
interference of Congress, in a time of peace, with 
slavery within the states and to its abolition in 
the District of Columbia. 

Recollecting his action upon these questions, 



Slavery Agitation. 125 

so much in accord with southern sentiments, Mr. 
Adams, was, perhaps, in no placable mood to 
with-hold hard and exasperating blows from those 
^«rho had so recently aided in his presidential de- 
feat, and he at once became the active, determin- 
ed and untiring ally of the abolition party in main* 
taining upon the floor of Congress, their doctrine 
of the right of petition and in arousing the anti- 
slavery feeling of the North in reference to the 
future of Texas. Neither was his course at this 
time at variance with his convictions of early life, 
as indicated by his diary where, alluding to the 
Missouri compromise of 1820, he says that the 
Cabinet of Mr. Monroe, of which he and Mr. Cal- 
houn were members, was unanimous in the opin- 
ion that it was constitutional, and adds: 

"I have favored this Missouri compromise, 
believing: it to be all that could be effected under 
the present Constitution, and from extreme un- 
willingness to put the Union at hazzard. But 
perhaps it would have been a wiser as well as 
bolder course to have persisted in the restriction 
upon Missouri till it should have terminated in a 
convention of the states to amend and revise the 
Constitution. This would have produced a new 
Union of thirteen or fourteen States, unpolluted 
with slavery, with a great and glorious object to 
effect, namely, that of rallying to their standard 
the other states by the universal emancipation of 
their slaves. If the Union is to be dissolved, 
slavery is precisely the question upon which it 



126 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley, 

ought to break. For the present, however, the 
contest is laid asleep" 

His feelings thus indicated, characterized his 
course to the last and when the annexation of 
Texas was near consummation, found expression in 
an address of thirteen anti-slavery members of 
Congress, headed by himself, who denounced the 
measure in the vseverest and most inilamatory 
language and as one "so injurious to the interests 
and abhorrent to the feelings of the people of the 
free states as in our opinion, not only inevitably to 
result in a dissolution of the Union but fvill}^ to 
justify it, and we not onl}" assert that the people 
of the free states ought not to submit to it, but 
we say with confidence, they would not submit to 
it." 

In such a champion, so learned, cool, energet- 
ic and persevering the most ultra anti-slavery man 
had a tower of strength, which never failed him 
in time of need. 

The petitions themselves evinced the earn- 
estness, the sincerity and the fixed resolution of 
the petitioners. Some were couched in inild and 
unobjectionable language as if avoiding to give 
offence but seeking to do away with what the^^ 
considered a great national evil, others bristled 
with harsh epithets, and reflected the bitter and 
envenomed feelings of those, who, outside of the 
halls of Congress, from the public rostrum, assail- 
ed the Constitution as a "covenant with hell". It 
was contended that, whatever the tone and charac- 



Slavery Agitation. 127 

ter of tile petitions, the constitution declar- 
ed that Congress should make no law abridging 
**the right of the people peaceably to assemble 
and petition the government for a redress of 
grievances" and that it was the imperative duty 
of the government to receive the petition, refer 
them to a committee for investigation and report 
*for the final action of Congress. On the other 
side, it was urged that while the petitioners could 
not be deprived of his legal right to complain of 
what he conceived a grievance, 3^et when the 
character of the complaint was well understood, 
was calculated to produce great exasperations dan- 
gerous to the best interests of the country and 
was obnoxious to the sentiments of a large and 
overwhelmning majority of the American peo- 
ple, that their representatives had a perfect and 
constitutional right to make such disposition of 
the petition as their self respect and sense of 
duty to their constituents required. The doctrine 
maintained by the petitioners, it was urged, open- 
ed the door for the introduction and conversion of 
Congress into a theater for the discussion of every 
conceivable subject, such as slavery, the imitation 
of revolutionary France in the abolition of the 
Sabbath, the ostracism of the Bible, the establish- 
ment of a monarchy or the dissolution of the 
Union, etc., to the neglect of the real objects 
for which the government was instituted. 

As showing the temper of the House, and the 
antagonistic views of the members, it may not be 



128 Life of Bleazer Ulieelock Riplej^, 

out of place to give the following extracts from the 
remarks of William Slade, one of the ablest mem- 
bers of the Vermont delegation, and of Franklin 
Pierce, of New Hampshire, subsequently Presi- 
dent of the United States, on the other: 

Mr. Slade said; "for himself he was in favor 
of the prayer of the petition. The petitioners 
first wished the abolition of slavery within the 
District; so did he. They desired to abolish the 
slave trade in the District, and so did he. He 
was not, however, in favor of the immediate and 
unqualified abolition of slavery within the Dis- 
trict, because he believed it impracticable; and to 
seek it, would defeat the very object he and those 
who concurred with him desired. He believed 
there was no right of one man to hold another as 
property, and that the exercise of such power 
ought everywhere to cease; but the work should be 
done gradually. The states of the Union owed 
obligations to the African race; and it was their 
duty to prepare them for a state of emancipation 
and freedom. They were bound to enact laws for 
this purpose. He was an Anti-mason and an Abo- 
litionist on this principle, and always should be- 
He was, however, in favor of an iinmediate aboli- 
tion of the slave trade within the District of Co- 
lumbia. He said the sentiments of the people of 
the North had not been fairly described by gen- 
tlemen who had addressed the House. Gen- 
tlemen were altogether mistaken on this sub- 
ject. It was not a few miserable fanatics, as 
had deen asserted; and the gentleman from New 



Slavery^ Agitation. 129 

Hampshire (Mr. Pierce) was equally mistaken 
in thinking that not one out of five hundred of 
the people there, were in favor of this object. 
There was a full and deep feeling among the peo- 
ple at the North. Public meetings had been re- 
ferred to. Those meetings, Mr. S. said, applied 
only to the abolition of slavery generally, and not 
in this District. As proof of this, he referred 
to the Boston resolutions. Mr. S. then referred 
to the clause in the Constitution of the United 
States, giving Congress the right of exclusive ju- 
risdiction, and was understood to contend that that 
clause involved the entire jurisdiction, and as 
such, the right of Congress to legislate on the sub- 
ject of slavery here. Had it not been for the de- 
nunciatory language used by the abolitionsists, of 
land pirate and kidnapper, applied to the people 
of the South, he did not know but that he should 
have been an abolitionist himself on the whole 
question. He believed slavery an evil, and one 
that ought to be abolished, and that would eventu- 
ally be abolished every where." 

Mr. Pierce, who was absent at the time of Mr. 
Slade's attack, on a subsequent day in the course of 
replying to it, and the personal attacks of an 
abolition paper in New Hampshire, said, 

"Whether, as has been said, there be incident- 
ally a conjunction between two parties of this 
Union, to shake it to its centre, it was not for him 
to say, but he would express his belief that there 
was sufficient patriotism and moral firmness in 



i30 Life fJf Bleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

the suiiiiy clime, and patriotism and moral firm- 
ness enough among the snow capt hills of the 
north, to put down agitators, if they existed in 
both sections of the country, and to transmit an 
unbroken Union to posterity, with all the rights 
and privileges secured by the constitution and 
now happily enjoyed under it." 

' "What were the remarks for which he had 
been arraigned, not only before the public, but be- 
fore the Senate of the United States, as having 
been guilty of untruth in his place on that floor? 
What he said was, that there was no such dispo- 
sition among the people of his section of country 
as that indicated by the gentleman (Mr. vSlade,) 
and that not one in a hundred of Mr. P's constitu- 
ents who did not entertain the most sacred regard 
for the rights of their southern brethren, and not 
one in five hundred who would not have those 
rights protected at any and every hazard. When 
he made that remark, he did not, of course, intend 
to include the children who knew not what they 
did, nor the ladies, who, in their proper sphere, 
had his highest respect and veneration. He 
meant to speak of the ^^eomanry of his country, 
the legal voters. With this qualification, he was 
prepared to re-assert all he said before. He 
would go further. Within the last six months, 
as every one there must know, the subject of 
abolition had been much agitated in public, and 
he had never seen yet the first abolitionist, man, 
woman or child, within his knowledge, in the 
district in which he resided." 



Slavery Agitation. 131 

Mr. Slade and Mr. Pierce, represented in 
congress, the radical and the conservative 
elements of the north, at this period, and while 
the one fanned the flames of sectional strife the 
other attempted to allay and extinguish them. 
General Ripley was desirous of contributing to 
the latter result, and having hazarded his life 
upon the battle field to maintain the rights of his 
country against an imperious and domineering 
foreig-n foe, so also he was now anxious to subdue 
the storm which threatened our domestic peace 
and our national Union. 

When the question of disposing of one of the 
petitions, was under consideration he said "This 
was a grave and important question. There was 
no subject of deeper interest in the quarter of 
the country from whence he came. He had been 
sent here to oppose every effort of a certain class 
of citizens, in reference to slavery within this 
District, or elsewhere. In disposing of the ques- 
tion before the House, care should be taken rather 
to allay the public feeling than to add to the exist- 
ing excitement. The right of petition was a 
solemn one, and had been guaranteed from the 
time of Magna Charta to the present moment. 
Our citizens have a right to petition for a change 
of their Constitution, and indeed for a change in 
the form of their Government. Every decorous 
memorial should be received; but when received^ 
it is in the power of the House to dispose of it as 
it may deem proper. The motion to reject this 
petition was an incipient question, and, in his 



132 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

opinion, should take precedence. He again 
adverted to the great excitement in the South on 
this subject, and the importance of allaying that 
excitment by a decisive course here. If the gen- 
tlemen froin the North were sincere in their 
friendship for their brethern in the South, and 
were desirous of breaking down the double wall 
of partition between these two sections of the 
country, they could give an earnest on the pres- 
ent occasion, by voting promptly to reject this 
petition; and when it shall go forth that we have 
rejected it by a vast majority, it will have an ef- 
fect even upon the fanatics themselves, who do 
not understand the position and feeling of the 
South on this subject, while it will, at the same 
time, allay the existing excitement in that portion 
of the country." 

At a late day in the session in 1836, Congress 
decided that all memorials relating to the subject 
of slavery should be received and laid upon the 
table without any further consideration. This 
rule was recommended by a special committee of 
which Pinckney, of South Carolina was chairman, 
and which had been appointed in pursuance of a 
resolution which he had many weeks previously 
presented and which was adopted by a large major- 
ity, that memorials for the abolition of slavery in 
the District should be referred to a select commit- 
tee with instructions to report that Congress pos- 
sesses no constitutional authorit}^ to interfere with 
slavery in the states and that in the opinion of the 



Slavery Agita Hon. 1 3'S 

House, Congress ought not to interfere in any 
lAray with slavery in the District of Columbia, be^ 
cause it would be a violation of the public faith, 
unwise, impolitic and dangerous to the Union. 
Mr. Adams and six others, a majority of them 
from the South, voted against that portion of the 
rule that referred to the states, while seventy-six 
votes were given against that portion which relat- 
ed to the impolicy of interfering with the subject 
in the District of Columbia. 

The rule that thus provided for the summary 
disposition of abolition petitions greatly incensed 
Mr. Adams and became the object of his an- 
nual and pertinacious attacks. Aided by the 
growing anti-slavery feeling of the North, intensi- 
fied by the continual and often tumultuous agita- 
tion of the slavery question in Congress and by 
the proposed annexation of Texas, he finally suc- 
ceeded in 1844, in having it stricken from the 
Rules of the House. 

Another phase of slavery agitation was pre- 
sented by the condition of Texas, and when a Bill 
appropriating money for the defense of the west- 
ern frontier and to prevent any incursions into 
the United States in the war then existing be- 
tween Mexico and Texas, Mr. Adams was prompt 
to sieze the opportunity to object in advance to the 
annexation of Texas and to arouse the anti-slavery 
feeling of the . country and said, among other 
things, if he had been rightly informed, this was 
a war of Texas to establish slavery in the repub- 



134 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

lie of Texas, whieh had been banished by the 
United Mexican vStates, that it was a resistance 
against the abolition of slavery^ by Mexico, and 
that Texas was making war to establish that 
slavery wdiich had been abolished; Now if this 
was the case and if the acknowledgment of the 
independence of Texas was to follow by an appli- 
cation to admit her to become one of the states of 
this Union, he begged leave to declare off from 
that reception. He would be for receiving no 
such addition to the United States." Stung by the 
replies which his remarks had elicited and by the 
direct charge that he was solely responsible for 
the treaty negotiated during the administration of 
Monroe, by which the boundary was so fixed as 
gave Texas to Mexico, he emphatically declared 
"that/ze was the last man of Mr.Monroe's admin- 
istration who consented to the treat}^ and that he 
was the only member of that administration who 
was for holding on to it." 

General Ripley followed him, discussing the 
difficulties growing out of the imdefined bounda- 
ry line settled by the treaty between the United 
States and Mexico, and "expressing his surprise 
at what had fallen from the gentleman from Mas- 
sachusetts when he remembered who was the 
author of the eloquent and learned defence of 
General Jackson's taking possession of Pensacola, 
the principle of which was identical with the ex- 
igency on our Louisiana border." 

Despite the opposition of Mr. Adams and his 



Slavery Agitation, 135 

co-ad jutors and after the crushing defeat of the 
^Mexicans, Texas hastened to seek recognition 
from foreign governments. The British Minister, 
Palmerston, assured the Texas commissioner. 
General Henderson, that if Texas would with* 
draw the proposition of annexation to the United 
States, England would recognize her independ- 
ence. This proposition was immediately with- 
drawn, but notwithstanding this, the United 
States recognized the independence of Texas on 
the 3d of March, 1837, being the last da}^ of Jack- 
son's administration, France followed the exani' 
pie on the 25th of September, 1839; Belgium and 
Holland soon after,and England did the same in a 
treat}^ made November 13, 1840. Whatever opin- 
ion may be entertained of the merits of the con- 
troversy between Mexico and Texas, one distin- 
guished American statesman and author, Mrv 
Blaine, forty years after annexation was consum- 
mated wrote: "But Texas had passed definitely 
and finally beyond the control of Mexico, and the 
practical issue was, whether we should incorpo- 
rate her in the Union, or leave her to drift in un- 
certain currents, possibly to form European alli- 
ances, which we should afterwards be compelled, 
in self defence, to destroy. An astute statesman 
of that period summed up the whole case when he 
declared that it was wiser polic}^ to annex Texas 
and accept the issue of immediate war with Mex- 
ico, than to leave Texas in nominal independence, 
involving us probably in ultimate war with Eng- 
land. 



136 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

*'The entire histor}^ of subsequent events has 
vindicated the wisdom, the courage and the 
statesmanship with which the democratic party 
dealt with this question in 1844.'* 

In view of events subsequent to annexation, 
the student of history, indulging in speculation, 
has a wide field for conjecture. Had the exclu- 
sion policy prevailed what would be the present 
condition of Texas? Would it not constitute a 
vast slave territor}", enriched and strengthened 
by an immense influx of population after the col- 
lapse of the confederate government, and bound 
to Great Britain in the closest social, political and 
commercial alliance, instead of being the great 
and noble state it now is, w4th territorial area of 
imperial dimensions dedicated to freedom? 

The frankness with w^hich General Ripley 
avowed his sentiments during this session evinces 
his anxiety to preserve fraternal relations be- 
tween the states and to protect what he conceived 
the constitutional rights of his constituents, but vm- 
derstanding as he did the temper of both sections, 
he was not insensible to the gravity of the con- 
troversy or unmindful of the teachings of historj^, 
and came to the conclusion that slavery would 
become extinct in a hundred years and so exprss- 
ed himself to a friend in 1837. 

But so rapidly did events bearing upon slav- 
ery, succeed each other, that its final extinction 
was effected in one fourth of the predicted time, 
and now, after the lapse of a quarter of a century, 



Slavery Agitation. 137 

having passed through the asperities of political 
strife and calamities of civil war, in the quietude 
of peace, surrounded by the evidence of national 
prosperity and hopeful of the future, the A^mer- 
ican citizen may bow before the altar consecrated 
throughout the land to freedom, and reverently ex- 
claim "what hath God wrought!" 

Upon the adjournment of Congress, General 
Ripley visited his New England friends, return- 
ing to Washington in time to resume his seat in 
December, 1836. 



CHAPTER IV. 



At the second session of the Twent3^-fourth 
Congress, he was joined in Washington by his 
brother-in-law, Honorable Judah Dana,of Fryburg, 
Maine, and grand-son of Israel Putnam, of Revo- 
lutionary fame. General Ripley in early life had 
been a student in his office when fitting for the 
bar,- had stood by his side in supporting the dem- 
ocratic party prior to the war of 1812, and both 
now appeared in Congress as the friends and sup- 
porters of General Jackson. Dana, having been 
appointed United States Senator from Maine in 
the place of Senator Shepley, resigned, soon 
after taking his seat, voted for Benton's famous 
expunging resolution of the vote of censure upon 
Jackson. In the course of the debate Dana ex- 
pressed his pleasure in being able to contribute 
by his vote to this act of justice to the President. 

This subject had greatly excited the public 
mind since its first introduction. Jackson's course 
with regard to the removal of the United States 
revenue from the United States Bank in which it 
had been deposited, had aroused to the highest 
pitch the fury of the friends of the bank and par- 
ticularly of the leaders of the whig part}-. These 
thought the time opportune for the crushing of 
their great political antagonist and the party 
which sustained him. Cla}^ at once with his usual 



T^venty-foiirth Congress. 139 

boldness and skill pushed through the vSenate on 
the 28th of March, 1834, a resolution condemning 
in the strongest terms the action of the president 
as a violation of his constitutional obligations and 
as meriting rebuke and condemnation. The presi- 
dent immediatel}^ strongly protested upon various 
o^rounds asrainst this course of the Senate and one 
of his friends. Senator Benton, promptly gave 
notice that he would introduce a resolution to ex- 
punge Clay's resolution of censure from the jour- 
nal of the Senate and would persist in this effort 
until it was crowned with success or until his own 
political life should terminate. 

The whole country became agitated over the 
question. vState legislatures and the people at 
large made their feelings known upon the one 
side or the other at the National Capital and as 
Clay was defiant, vituperative, eloquent and 
adroit to defeat the obloquy aimed at his mea- 
sure, so Benton was resolute, bold, and untiring 
in redeeming his pledge. At las the succeeded 
and carried his resolution through the Senate on 
the 16th da}^ of March, 1837, by a majority of five, 
and in accordance with it, the Secretary of the 
vSenate at once proceeded to draw broad dark 
lines around Mr. Clay's condemnatory resolution, 
and wrote across its face, "Expunged by order of 
the Senate, the 16th day of March, 1837." 

General Jackson was naturally and intensely 
absorbed in the progress of the contest and gave 
a "grand dinner" to those Senators who had voted 



140 Life of Bletizer Wheelock Ripley. 

for his exculpation and their wives, but being 
too much enfeebled by sickness he only met them 
at the table, placed Benton in the chair and with- 
drew to his sick rooin. "That expungation, (said 
Benton) was the crowning glory of Jackson's civil, 
as New Orleans had been of his military life." 

While the President was the object of attack 
and defense in the Senate at this session, his of- 
ficial and public acts were subjected to the most 
bitter, if not malignant assaults in the House. 
Henry A. Wise, of Virginia, and Bailie Peyton, 
of Tennessee, were conspicious in the attacks up- 
on the president. The former seizing upon the 
President's message as a pretext for unloading 
his batteries of political warfare, and probably 
with a view of diminishing the popularit}^ of the 
incoming administration to which Jackson was 
known to be favorable, on tlie 12th of December, 
1836, in the committee of the whole, submitted a 
resolution "that a committee should be appointed 
upon that part of the President's message which 
related to the condition of the various Executive 
Departments, the ability and integrity with which 
the}^ have been conducted, the vigilant and faith- 
ful discharge of the public business in all of them, 
and the causes of complaint from any quarter, 
of the manner in which they have fulfilled the 
objects of their creation." 

Mr. Wise then proceeded to discuss the 
policy, conduct and merits of the president, 
drawing a parallel between him and several of 



Twenty-fourth Congress. 141 

the Roman Emperors and indulging in severe 
strictures upon the last Message. 

His motion was carried by a vote yeas 86, 
nays 78; the committee was ordered to consist of 
nine, and the committee rose and reported to the 
House. An acrimonious discussion arose upon its 
adoption, but it was ultimately adopted almost 
unanimously, yeas 165, nays 9. General Ripley 
was absent, but the resolution was voted for alike 
by the friends and opponents of the administra- 
tion: General Ripley was hostile to the resolu- 
tion, when first presented, contending that it was 
a covert attempt to blacken the character of 
Jackson, was unprecedented in the history of the 
country, and that before an investigation was 
ordered specific charges should be made to which 
the attention of the committees should be 
directed. 

He said; "Had this been a proposition to in- 
quire into the condition of the Department of 
State, of the Treasury, of the Nav}^ and War 
Department, and the General Post Office with a 
view to investigate abuses, if they exist, no per- 
son would be more willing to join in the inquiry 
than myself. No individual would be more 
anxious to enforce the responsibilities of subordi- 
nate officers. 

"There are none who will go further to ferret 
out malpractices, and if they really exist, to 
punish them with the high constitutional power 
of this House. Had the resolution for inqidry 



142 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley, 

had these objects solely and honestly in view, 
I should have been the last to oppose it. But 
vSir, the President is constitutionally responsible 
for the whole of the Executive Department; the 
various radia of its powers concentrate, as well its 
responsibilities as its honors, upon him; and when 
I take these circumstances into view, and also 
consider the spirit in which this debate has been 
conducted, the position of the President cannot be 
observed without exciting our share of sympathy, 
shall we at a moment when his connection with 
the American people is about to terminate for- 
ever, and all the aspirations of ambition are to be 
dissolved by age, infirmities and sickness; when 
the consciousness of his high and devoted ser- 
vices which we all know he must possess, and 
the enthusiastic affection of the American people 
were about to cheer the evening of his life and to 
gild his expiring lamp, is it right or proper for 
the representatives of the people whom he suc- 
cored and saved, to cut off this departing 
solace, and to embitter his last days, by adopting 
a resolution, which, if adopted, will sanction an 
opinion of this House, that corruption and 
Andrew Jackson have been coupled together! 
Will they do this without specific charges,without 
some allegation sustained at least by the endorse- 
ment of one individual in the House, who will 
give his name to jiosterity as the author of the 
allegation! * * * * 

''Party spirit has raged and misrepresented 
all your Presidents during their term of office,but 



Twenty- fourth Congress. 143 

they have passed and are passing off the stage of 
action, all with the award of official and personal 
integrity. Some have not been re-elected by the 
people, but against them no charge of corruption 
is found embodied in the annals of the country. 
Nor does any American citizen, at even this 
lapse of time, impeach their integrity, no one 
charges them (Jefferson and Madison) with 
wilful or wanton corruption while administering 
the affairs of the commonwealth. The only alle- 
gation made against them, as they quit the scene 
of their labors, of their glories and their services, 
were that a destingusished member, formerly 
of Virginia, accused Mr. Jefferson of retiring 
with a political falsehood in his mouth; and 
an equally distinguished member from 
Massachusetts gave his solitary vote to im- 
peach Mr. Madison, I have no doubt, sir, after 
the execitement of party was over, both of these 
gentlemen regretted their allegations. The 
charges never have, and never will affect the 
great patriarch of liberty, the author of the Dec- 
laration of Independence,or his equally illustrious 
friend, the founder and champion of our constitu- 
tion. The one unfurled to the world, the princi- 
ples of popular government, the other more 
than any man connected liberty with law and se- 
cured an equality of political rights by securing 
to society the fruits of labor. * ' * 

"The honorable member (Mr. Peyton, of Ten- 
nessee) has also referred to the Secretery of the 



144 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

Treasury as being embraced in the general alle- 
gation of corruption. Sir, the lofty character of 
Levi Woodbury is too well known to this House 
and to this Nation, to require any comment from 
me. Born, reared and educated amidst the granite 
mountains of my native state, his stern and ster- 
ling virtues had already carried him to the high- 
est honors of New Hampshire, when in the midst 
of the panic battle, he was called to the arduous 
duties of the Treasury of the United States. 
New England may justl}" feel proud of the high 
character which he has reflected back upon his 
native land. And let me ask, what inducement 
to corruption can there be on the part of Levi 
Woodbur}"? There has been no special charge 
against him, not a whisper of prejudice that he 
has done anything to forfeit his exalted character. 
He is affluent in his personal situation, with every 
thing to make him happy in domestic life, and 
above all, principles of the most stern and un- 
bending integrity are interwoven with his nature. 
The only allegation insinuated against him is, that, 
in the exercise of his duty imposed by a law 
passed by this House, he is compelled to transact 
official business with an agent of the deposite 
banks. "That agent is no agent of this govern- 
ment, we have no constitutional power over 
him."f * * * * _^ 

"I feel sir, that I should have but unworthil}^ 

fAt a late period, Mr. Woodbury became a distinguished 
member of the United States Court. 



Tiren tj ^-fo urth Congress. 1 45 

discharged my duty as a representative of 
Louisiana, had I not raised rn^^ voice in opposi- 
tion to this resohition! Whatever may be the 
personal or political predilections of mj^ constitu- 
ents, gratitude to Andrew Jackson for the inesti- 
mable benefits, he has conferred upon the citizens 
of our vState is an almost pervading sentiment. 
It is like the vestal flame, guarded with intense 
care, and faithfull}^ transmitted from one genera- 
tion to another."* 

At a subsequent day a select committee was 
appointed in accordance with Wise's Resolution, 
but no report was made upon the subject matter 
referred to it. Wise and Peyton were both 
members of the committee and in one of its 
meetings the latter became embroiled in a 
cpiarrel with Reuben B. Whilncj^ a witness, 
whom the committee considered contumacious; 
Peyton flew into an ungovernable and discred- 
itable passion. Wise espoused his cause, the 
witness was arrested and brought to the bar of 
the House to answer for his coneluct and from 
the investigation which followed ziA ccnsiimed 
much time until the ver}^ eve of the adjournment 
of the 24tli congress, it would not have been 
unnatural for a stranger to infer that Wise anel 
Pe5^ton for their overbearing conduct and pro- 
fanity towards the witness, were culprits whose 
conduct was the svibject of the investigation. 

General Riple^^ soon after the effort he made 

^Congressional Globe App. p 30-31 — 1836-7. 



146 Life of Eleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

ivL vindication of Jackson was precluded by ill 
health from further active participation in the 
proceedings of Congress. Re-elected in 1836 by 
an overwhelming majority, he was unable to take 
his seat in the 25th Congress. 

Prior to the adjournment of the 24th Congress, 
in the spring of 1837, he experienced an attack 
resembling parah^sis and at first his life was 
despaired of. Slowly regaining sufficient strength 
to travel, he commenced his journey homeward, 
where he arrived in the latter part of Maj^ with 
his health apparently somewhat improved and it 
was hoped b}^ his many friends that it would be 
sufficiently restored to enable him to discharge 
the duties of representative, but these hopes 
were doomed to disappointment. 

At times, his mind seemed endowed with 
unusual vigor while at other inoments he ap- 
peared laboring under a high state of nervous 
excitment if not alienation of mind, doubtless 
aggravated by the effects of the wound received 
at the sortie of Fort Erie. 

In an almost helpless condition, his strength 
and mental powers gradually sinking, he 
lingered vmtil the second of March, A. D., 1839, 
when he expired at his plantation in the Parish 
of East Feliciana. He was removed for inter- 
ment to the plantation of Judge Boyle in West 
Feliciana, the family burying ground of his 
surviving widow, where the last sad rites to the 



Slavery Agitation. 1 47 

departed, were paid to his remains by the Louis- 
iana Jackson vohniteer military coinpany. 

General Ripley was married twice, his first 
wife whom he married in 1811, was the daughter 
of Reverend Thomas Allen, of Pittsfield, Mas- 
sachusetts, who was chaplain in the Revolutionary 
war, and was with General Stark at the battle 
of Bennington, and died at the Bay of Biloxi 
in 1820. A son and daughter were the fruits 
of this marriage and upon the death of their 
mother were sent to their Uncle, General James 
W. Ripley, of Fryburg, Maine, to be educated, 
where they remained until their father some 
years subsequentl}^ married Mrs. Smith, of the 
Parish of West Feliciana, Louisiana, when they 
returned to the paternal roof. The son Henry, 
as already narrated, fell in t\\^ c:ui3i of Texas 
and the daughter married Thornton Lawson, 
Esq., who at the time of his death was judge of 
the judicial district in which heresided, and who, 
previous to going upon the bench, had been 
an active and influential member of the demo- 
cratic party in the State. A Tennesseean by 
birth, he came to the state with letters of 
introduction from Jackson to whom he was 
greatly attached. His wife survived him several 
3-ears, and died in 1872 in the Parish of St. Charles. 
Her only child, a daughter, elied many years 
previously in New Orleans. Mrs. Lawson was 
a lady of great intellectual vigor, of fascinating 
manners and was universally esteemed and 



148 Life of Bleazer Wheelock Ripley. 

beloved. The death of those nearest and dearest to 
her clouded her last days with profound sorrow 
and at times obscured her reason to such an 
extent as to require great watchfulness upon the 
part of her friends. 

General Riple}^ had no children by the second 
marriage and his surviving widow afterwards 
married and of whom her daughter writes; "she 
died October 29th, 1869, at the age of sixty-three, 
honored and loved by all that knew her." 



APPENDIX. 

I. 

Politics ill New England Prior to 1815. 

Allusion has been made in the preceding Life 
of Ripley to his early affiliation with the republi- 
can party and to the virulence of party spirit 
prior to 1815, and without then enlarging upon 
those topics we have reserved a brief survey of 
them as more appropriate to this place. 

The charter of a United States Bank, the dif- 
ficulties with France, the Alien and Sedition laws, 
the pacific measures of Jefferson and the war with 
Great Britain greatly agitated the public mind 
during that period, and are not devoidof interest 
after the lapse of three quarters of a century, and 
enable us to form a juster estimate of the 
honesty, patriotism and wisdom of those who dis- 
cussed and settled those exi.ting questions. 

The convention of 1787, after a long and la- 
borious session, succeeded in framing and sub- 
mitting to the people of the States for ratification, 
that Constitution, which, with some subsequent 
amendment, has proved for a century, the great 
charter of our political principles and the sup- 
port of our national existence. During the dis- 
cussions of its different provisions in the conven- 
tion and before the people, a great difference of 



152 Adoption of the Constitution. 

opinion was manifested as to its merits and de- 
fects. It was only after the most strenuous ex- 
ertions b}^ its friends, including Washington, 
Hamilton, Madison, Jay and others of distinguish- 
ed ability, was its ratification secured against the 
vigorous opposition of such revolutionar}^ patri- 
ots as vSamuel Adams, George Clinton, and Pat- 
rick Henr3^ The latter were filled with appre- 
hensions that the proposed government, if estab- 
lished, would, b}" the assumption of implied pow- 
ers, become a consolidated government that 
would override the reserved rights of the states 
and eventuall}^ prove dangerous to the liberties 
of the people. 

With the ratification of the Constitution, all 
eyes turned to Washington as a fit man to be 
placed at the head of the new government and he 
was twice elected with gratif3nng unanimit}^ to 
the exalted position of President. For eight 3^ears 
he performed his executive duties so wisel}^ and 
well as to secure to himself the love and admira- 
tion of his countrymen. 

At this period the old dj^nasties of Europe 
were either crumbling into ruins or threatened 
with destruction by the advancing light and in- 
vigorating influences of republican ideas, and so 
profound and wide spread was the sympath}" in 
the United states with the cause of freedom 
among the oppressed and down trodden people 
of other lands that it threatened to overstep the 
boundaries of prudence and plunge our govern- 



Jefferson and Hamilton. 153 

nieiit unwisely into European conflicts. Wash- 
ington with keen perception saw the danger 
and averted it with cool judgment and firm hand. 
The same good judgment and patriotism were 
exhibited in the management of the complicated 
and nice questions which resulted from the revo- 
lutionary war, such as providing for the payment 
of the Continental and State debts, contracted in 
sustaining the war, and just remuneration to the 
suffering soldiers who had so bravely borne its 
burdens. To these were added questions bearing 
upon the future effectiveness of the government, 
such as the question of a national bank. Upon 
some of these questions, there was harmony of 
opinion but upon others the widest difference 
and the fiercest contest, and out of them grew 
those political organizations, which were known 
until 1815, as republican or democratic on the one 
side and federal upon the other. As among the 
people, so the same division existed in tlie cabi- 
net of the president, those two great men, 
Thomas Jefferson, the philanthropist, and Alex- 
ander Hamilton, the great financier, representing 
opposite sides. 

While the work of creating the ncAV Consti- 
tution was going on in this country and while 
Hamilton was giving it the support of his great 
intellect, Jefferson was representing his country 
in France where his feelings were stronglj^ enlist- 
ed in the republican cause. By his draft of the 
Declaration of American Independence in 1776, 
his name had become inseparably connected 



154 Jefferson as a Reformer. 

with that instrument, while his subsequent efforts 
to adapt the institutions of his native Virg^inia to 
republican principles caused him to be recogniz- 
ed ever}^ where as an illustrious statesman. Re- 
tiring from Congress, he took his seat in the Vir- 
ginia House of Burgesses, in 1776, and became 
immediately the master spirit in revolutionizing 
the domestic and long established institutions of 
the State. 

The whole system of entails, which transmit- 
ted land and slaves from generation to genera- 
tion without the power of alienation and secure 
from the claims of creditors was soon swept away 
b}^ his vigorous action. The same fate soon over- 
took the law of primogeniture under which the 
eldest son inherited the land and slaves of his 
father. Such a far reaching revolution of prop- 
ertj^ interests encountered strong opposition 
from the parties directl}- affected and the bitter 
hostility which it aroused against him is thus 
described by his biographer. ''That distinguish- 
ed class, whose existence as a social caste, had 
been forever destroyed, reviled the destroyer 
from this time forth with relentless animosity; 
and even to the second and fourth generations, 
the descendants of manj^ of these patrician 
families vindictivel}^ cursed the vStatesman who 
had placed them on a level with the rest of their 
covmtrymen." 

He aimed at the establishment of as com- 
plete religious freedom as now exists in the 



Jefferson as a Reformer. 155 

United States, but the bill he introduced for this 
purpose was stubbornly resisted by the establish- 
ed church and did not become a law to its full 
extent until 1786. 

Two important subjects, which were dear 
to his heart, failed of accomplishment. One 
was the adoption of an extensive and far reaching 
school sj^stem and the other, a law providing- for 
the abolition of slaver3^ Of the latter he wrote 
in 1821; "it was found that the public mind w^ould 
not yet bear the proposition, nor wall it bear it even 
to this day, j^et the day is not distant W'hen it must 
bear and adopt it, or worse will follow. Nothing 
is more certainly written in the book of fate than 
that these people are to be free." Being a mem- 
ber of Congress in 1783, he presented the deed 
of cession made by Virginia of her claim to the 
North Western territor}^ and was placed upon a 
committee to draw up a plan for its government. 
This plan which contemplated new States in 
the future has been ascribed to him and con- 
tained a provision, "that after the year 1800, of 
the christian era tliere shall be neither slavery 
nor involuntary servitude in any of the said 
states, otherwise than in punishment of crimes, 
etc." 

This provision, however, was defeated, only 
six of the North Eastern and Middle States 
voting for it. It was destined to reappear with- 
out reference to a future period in the memorable 
ordinance of 1787 providing for the government 



156 Jefferson and Hamilton. 

of the territory north west of the Ohio river, 
which, in positive terms, exchided slaver)^ from 
the territory, and remains a perpetual monu- 
ment of the views and aspirations of the founders 
of the Republic. 

Having been Minister to France, in 1789, 
Jefferson returned to the United States, and 
upon the solicitation of Washington, and 
strongly urged by Madison was induced to 
accept the position of vSecretary of the foreign 
Department and entered upon the discharge of 
its duties in March 1790. 

At this period the financial condition of the 
country absorbed the public mind and was 
discussed upon different sides with great vehe- 
mence. Hamilton, as Secretary of the Treasur}-, 
had brought to the subject his great and mar- 
velous financiering ability and, under his skill- 
ful leadership, the foreign debt and the domestic 
National debt were disposed of in accordance 
with his recommendations, but his scheme for 
the assumption of the war debts of the individual 
States met with fierce opposition, and on the 29th 
of March was voted down by a small majorit3^ 
The excitment, already intense, increased, and the 
assumjjtion of the State debts occupied all minds 
to the exclusion of other matters. Congress met 
and adjourned without doing an^^thing. 

The secretary of the Treasury was over- 
whelmed with profound anxiety and the crisis 
called into activity all the resources of his fertile 



c? 



Jeff^erson and Hamilton, 15 

mind to avert the defeat of one of his cherished 
measures and to secure a few coveted votes. 

The permanent location of the national 
Capital was still unsettled and created bitter con- 
trovers3^ Hamilton eagerly seized upon this as 
a means of extricating himself from the difficul- 
ties with which he was encompassed and adroit- 
ly made advances to Jefferson to secure his co-op- 
eration. The latter, recently returned from 
Europe, and perhaps not fully realizing the cur- 
rent of public affairs or the character of Hamilton 
or his designs as afterwards portrayed by himself 
grave his influence in the desired direction and 
the assumption of the State debts and the per- 
manent location of the National Capital upon the 
banks of the Potomac were soon accomplished. 

Jefferson, however, was not at ease for the 
part he performed in the transaction, and ere 
long made the humiliating acknowledgement 
that he had been duped by Hamilton. The}'^ 
soon became widely estranged and began to look 
upon each other with profound dislike. This 
Avas so strong with Jefferson, that he was unwill- 
ing to remain in the cabinet but Washington 
suceeded in retaining him till the close of 1793. 

At the session of Congress which convened 
in December 1790, Hamilton submitted his plan 
of a National Bank and discussed w^ith his custo- 
mary abilit}^ the constitutionality, the utility and 
expediency of such an institution. A charter of 
a bank having finally passed Congress, the presi- 



158 United States Bank. 

dent, before giving" it his approval, required of 
his constitutional advisers their opinions in writ- 
ing as to its constitutionality. Jefferson and Ran- 
dolph, the attorney general, were decidedl}^ of the 
opinion that Congress, by the passage of the bill, 
had obviously transcended their constitutional pow- 
ers, while Hamilton, and Knox, Secretary of War, 
as decidedly maintained a contrary opinion. Af- 
ter mature consideration, the president approved 
the law, but in commenting upon this, Smucker, 
in his life of Hamilton, says: 

"His habitual propensity to add vigor to tlie 
Union, inclined him to the conviction that the 
Bank was full^^ authorized b}^ the Constitution, 
and he accordingly gave the sanction of his sig- 
nature to the act of incorporation. It cannot be 
doubted, however, that his mind had been long 
predetermined in favor of the measure; and, that 
however he might hold his judgment open to a 
conviction of its illegalit}^ should it be made so 
to appear to him, yet that his wishes and affec- 
tions toward it as a favorite measure of his feder- 
al policy, had closed those avenues to conviction, 
which can only bias the understanding when the 
feelings are neutral and the desires uninfluenced 
toward a particular conclusion." 

At the preceding session of Congress, the 
proposition to assume the pa3^ment of the State 
debts had been inveighed against as unconstitu- 
tional and as conferring upon the general govern- 
ment dangerous and preponderating influence ac- 



Development of Parties. 159 

companied by a pernicious diminution of the 
consequence and influence of the vState govern- 
ments. All those who had been opposed to the 
ratification of the Constitution as tending to build 
up a grand consolidated government naturally 
gravitated to this side of the question. Their 
numbers were now^ increased by those who were 
opposed to enlarging the powers of the govern- 
ment beyond those actually conferred, by a broad 
construction and by implication. Jefferson and 
Madison who had been so conspicuous in secur- 
ing the ratification of the constitution were among 
these. 

The discussions upon the assumption of the 
State debts, followed by that of the Bank ques- 
tion brought into full light the conflicting and in- 
harmonious views of public men and gave rise to 
those two adverse parties which were for many 
years known as the federal party upon the one 
side and republican and democratic upon the 
other. In the discussion of the bank question, 
Mr. Jefferson presented in unambiguous language 
his views of the powers of Congress, but his able 
and exhaustive argument, while clearly indicating 
the foundation and views of the republican party, 
failed to convince the judgment of Washington 
and presented the antagonistic views of Jefferson 
and Hamilton in the strongest light, placed each 
at the head of opposing parties and these, not 
confining themselves to the field of argument, 
soon passed into the boundless region of sus- 



160 Hamilton. 

picion and abuse. Jefferson and Hamilton were 
portrayed by their opponents with venomous 
pens and the leaders themselves lost all respeet 
for each other. 

Jefferson said that he told Washington in 
1792, "that though the people were sound, there 
were a numerous sect who had monarchy in con- 
templation; that the vSecretary of the Treasury 
was one of these. That I had heard him say that 
this Constitution was a shilly-shall}^ thing of 
mere milk and water, which could not last and 
was only good as a step to something better. 
That when we reflected that he had endeavored 
in the Convention to make an English constitu- 
tion of it, and when in failing in that we saw all 
his measures tending to bring it to the same 
thing, it was natural for us to be jealous; and par- 
ticularl}^ when we saw that these measures had 
established corruption in the Legislature where 
there was a squadron devoted to the nod of the 
Treasurer, doing whatever he had directed or 
which he should direct." 

While such was the light in which Hamilton 
appeared to Jefferson, Marshall, their great co- 
temporary, and of the same political party with 
Hamlinton, wrote of him: "While one party sin- 
cerely believes his object to be the preservation 
of the Constitution of the United vStates in its 
purity, the other, with perhaps equal sincerity 
imputed to him, the insiduous intention of sub- 
verting it. While his friends were persuaded 



Washington nnd Hamilton. 16 1 

that as a statesman he viewed foreign nations with 
an equal eye, his enemies could perceive in his 
conduct only hostilit}^ to France and friendship 
to her rival. 

In the good opinion of the President, to 
whom he was best known, he had always held 
a high place; and he carried with him out of 
office, the same cordial esteem for his character 
and respect for his taleiitvS, which had induced his 
appointment. 

As embarrassing and disagreeable as the 
antagonism of his two Secretaries proved to the 
President, he fulh^ appreciated their good quali- 
ties, held the scales of justice with even hand be- 
tween them, and knew what allowance to make 
for their mutual distrusts. These did not divert 
him from pursuing the even tenor of his wa}^ and 
doing that which he considered best for the inter- 
ests of his country. 

Notwithstanding the able and probably to 
many minds, unanswerable arguments of Jefferson, 
Washington finally approved of the bank bill, 
and its constitutionalit}'^ subsequently coming 
before the Supreme Court for consideration 
was sustained b}^ that august tribunal. This 
decision, however, did not secure the approval 
of many eminent men, remained for many years 
a subject of contention and bitter controversy and 
extensively divided public opinion. The estab- 
lishment of the bank and the opposition it evoked 
in Congress strengthened the antagonism of the 



162 Jefferson and Hamilton. 

Federal and Democratic parties and drew down 
upon Hamilton as the head of the former, for 
successive years, the mOvSt bitter assaults. He 
was held up to public execration as a monarchist 
and as aiming to establish his favorite strong 
government by insidiously and systematically 
subverting the safeguards of the constitution. 

On the other hand, Jefferson did not escape 
the fiercest vituperation from his political op- 
ponents. His religious vsentiments were bitterly 
assailed; he was pointed at as the base and servile 
tool of French revolutionary Jacobins, and 
nothing politically was too execrable to 1 e im- 
puted to him by his infuriated enemies. 

The repellent picture drawn by each party, 
and its leaders of the other side has been softened 
by time; what was, in the heat of party excite- 
ment considered just grounds of condemnation 
has been dispelled by the light of subsequent 
revelations and now both Jefferson and Hamilton 
receive the plaudits of the American people as 
statesmen and patriots seeking each according to 
his own judgement, the welfare of his country. 

The charge of being a monarchist, however 
pressed so heavily upon Hamilton, in conse- 
quence of his course in the Convention of 1787 
and the imfavorable remarks, in which he was 
said to have indulged, with regard to its imper- 
fections, that on the 16th of September 1803, in 
a letter addressed to Timothy Pickering, we are 
supplied by him with the following vindication: 



Hamilton's Self indication. 163 

*'The highest toned propositions, which I 
made in the Convention, were for a President, 
Senate and Judges, during good behavior; a 
House of Representatives for three years. 
Though I woukl have enlarged the legislative 
power of the general government, yet I never 
contemplated the abolition of the State govern- 
ments; but on the contrar}^ they were in some 
particulars, constituent parts of my plan. * * 

"And I ma}^ add that in the course of the 
discussions in the Convention, neither the propo- 
sitions thrown out for debate, nor even those who 
voted in the earlier stages of deliberation, were 
considered sis evidence of a definitive opinion in 
the proposer or voter. It appeared to be in sort 
understood that, with a view to free investigation 
experimental ^propositions might be made, which 
were to be received merel.y as suggestions for 
consideration. 

"Accordingly, it is a fact that my final opinion 
w^as against an executive during good behavior, 
on account of the increased danger to the pub- 
lic tranquillit5% incident to the election of a 
magistrate of his degree of permanency. In the 
plan of a Constiution which I drew up while the 
Covnention was sitting, and w^iich I communi- 
cated to Mr. Madison about the close of it, per- 
haps a day or two after, the office of President 
has no longer duration than three years." 

While the controversy between the two 
Secretaries and the two parties was character- 



164 Federal Tactics, 

ized, b}'' extreme bitterness, important 
measures upon which parties were organized and 
which were advocated by Hamilton, having been 
approved by Washington the federal party 
naturally looked upon the latter as identified 
with themselves and shrewdl}^ if not unfairly, 
attempted to untilize his popularity in the re- 
sponse which was made b}" Congress to one of the 
presidents annual messages. During the first two 
administrations, it was customary for the 
President to open the session of Congress with 
a speech and for the House to call in a body upon 
the president and deliver an address. In replying 
upon one of these occasions, the Federal party 
having the majority, the reply was so worded 
that in the opinion of repulican members, they 
were placed in the awkward joosition of voting 
against the reply or of expressing condemnation 
of their own political conduct. Among these 
were Andrew Jackson and Edward Livingston 
who, rather than stulifj^ themselves, voted in the 
negative. The Federalists at once availed them- 
selves of this as indicating hostility" to Washing- 
ton and as a means of strengthening themselves 
with the people. 

The true history of the affair was some forty 
years subsequently given by Livingston. Hav- 
ing just taken his seat in the United States Sen- 
ate, from Louisiana, he was present at the memo- 
rable debate betAveen Webster and Hayne, in 
1830, in which the former made his masterly vin- 
dication of New England, from the aspersions of 



Webster and Livingston. 165 

the latter, but in the course of which he took oc- 
casion to say to the amazement of Livingston: 
"'We know, or we might know, if we turn to the 
journals, who expressed respect, gratitude and 
regret, when he retired from the chief magistracy 
and who refused to express respect, gratitude or 
regret. I shall not open these journals." The 
arrow was doubtless aimed at President Jackson, 
but it hit Livingston as well and he was not dis- 
posed to submit in silence to undeserved censure. 

Promptl3- repl3ang, he expressed the opinion 
that the Senator would have done well to have 
opened those journals and ascertained the truth, 
avowed the veneration he had entertained for 
Washington from his childhood, and charged that 
the federal dominant party had so framed the 
customary annual reply to the President's mes- 
sage as would expose the minorit3% including 
Jackson and himself, if they voted for it, to the 
accusation of condemning themselves or of being 
hostile to the president. To avoid this, he pro- 
posed to amend the reply by declaring that 
''while we entertain a grateful ccnvicticn that 
your wisdom, friendship and patriotism have 
been signally conducive to the success of the 
present form of government, we csnnot forbear 
to express our deep sentiments of regret with 
which we contemplate your intended retirement 
from office." "Now sir," said Livingston, "ccm- 
pare this clause, which we were all ready to vote 
for and did vote for with that which was sup- 
ported by the majority and say which of them 



166 United Sta tes and France, 

expressed the greatest veneration for the person 
and personal character of Washington." 

John Adams, who had served as vice pres- 
ident during the whole period of Washington's 
adniinivStration and whose political opinions, and 
views of policy harmonized with those of the 
federal party, succeeded Washington by a ma- 
jority of three electoral votes over his competi- 
tor, Jefferson, the republican candidate. In this 
contest party lines were sharply drawn and 
each piirty niids great exertions for success. 
As the Constitution then stood, Jefferson became 
vice i^resident, but the virulence of party spirit 
did not subside. Adams continued for some 
time the same cabinet officers, which surrounded 
Washington at the time of his retirment. The 
country then was deeply affected by the ])olitical 
convulsions of Europe. Revolutionary France 
aimed to draw the United States, as an ally, into a 
crusade against the monarchical institutions of the 
old world. The prudence and wisdom of Wash- 
ington had prevented this, but his successor 
found the French revolutionary leaders indiffer- 
ent to American commercial rights treating 
American envoys with great disrespect and 
carrying things with such high hand as to bring 
the United vStates to the verge of a declaration of 
war, while, without it, naval conflicts had occurr- 
ed upon the ocean greatlj^ to the credit of the 
American naval marine. The spirit thus dis- 
plaj^ed was wholly unexpected b}- the French 



Alien unci Sedition Lmrs. 167 

rulers, moderated their haughty bearing and 
insufferable demands, and probably averted the 
inpending war. The course persued by the 
republican party in congress in opposing some 
of the war measures that were proposed, either 
though a belief that the^^ were xmnecessary or 
through sympathy w^ith the democratic spirit 
which pervaded Europe, had a tendency to 
strengthen the Administration with the people, 
when in 1798, perhaps in part, as war measures, 
combined possibly with an ulterior purpose to 
prevent criticism of public men, the federal party 
unfortunately for its own ascendency, pushed 
through Congress two laws, the Alien and Sedi- 
tion, which immediately became objects of the 
bitterest denunciations, were assailed as utterly 
subversive of the Constitution, as conferring 
despotic powers upon the president, and as 
subjecting the private citizen to the wicked 
devices of spies and informers. In resist- 
ing the passage of these laws in the ardor of 
debate, on the 21st. of June 1798, Edward Living- 
ston, then miember of Congress from the city of 
New York, said: "But if regardless of our duties 
as citizens and our solemn obligations as rep- 
resentatives; regardless of the rights of our 
constituents; regardless of every sanction, human 
and devine, we are ready to violate the Constitu- 
tion, we have sworn to defend, will the people 
submit to our unauthorized acts? Will the states 
sanction our usurped power? Sir, they ought not 
to submit; they would deserve the chains which 



168 Alien find Sedition Lan\^. 

these measures are forgeing for them, if they did 
not resist. ***** :^ 

My opinions, Sir, on this subject are explicit 
and I wish they may be known. They are, that 
whenever the hnvs manifestly infringe the Con- 
stitution under which they are made, the people 
ought not to hesitate which they should obey; 
if we exceed our powers, we become tryants and 
our acts have no effect." This speech was 
published and distributed ^ver the country, 
exciting great and widespread indignation. 
The Alien law empowered the president to order 
dangerous or suspected aliens to depart, the 
country with severe j^enalties for disobedience of 
this order, with power given to the president 
to modify the order so far as to allow the sus- 
pected person to remain in a designated place at 
the President's pleasure. The sedition law made 
it criminal to combine with intent to oppose any 
measures of the government of the United States 
or to defame the Legislature or the President bj' 
declarations tending to criminate the motives of 
either. Among the earliest of the few victims of 
this law was Matthew Lyon, an editor and pub- 
lisher of a paper in Vermont, and representative 
in congress from that State from 1797 to 1801. 
His conviction, imprisonment of four mounths. 
and fine of one thousand dollars, under the law 
created the wildest excitement throughout the 
State, and added to the unpopularity of the law 
and of the Federal party throughout the Union. 
His democratic friends hailed him as a martyr to 



Mathexv Lyon. 169 

the cause of civil liberty in vast concourse and 
with indignant feelings accompanied him 
with a popular ovation on his way to prison, from 
which he was released Feburary 7th 1799, and 
promptly raised the money with which to pay 
his fine. In this, however they had been antic- 
ipated by Lyon himself or some unknown friends. 
While member of Congress, he continued to dis- 
play upon a National theater his undying 
hatred to the law under which he had suffered 
and of the party which made it. After the party 
heat and political questions of that period had 
disappeared, the heirs of Lyon applied to con- 
gress to have the fine refunded to them. In 1840 
the subject was referred in the House of Re- 
presentatives to the Judiciary Committee, com- 
X30sed of some of the ablest lawyers in Congress, 
if not in the United States, which reported 
a bill to refund the fine, which passed the House 
by a vote of 121 to 15 and the Senate without op- 
position. As showing the character and operation 
of the law, one of the publictions, for which Lyon 
suffered, was in this language; "Cop3^ of a letter 
from an American diplomatic character in France 
(Joel Barlow) to a member of Congress in 
Philadelphia." 

"The misunderstanding between the two 
governments has become extremel}^ alarming; 
confidence is completely destroyed, mistrusts, 
jealousies, and a disposition to a wrong attribu- 
tion of motives are so apparent as to require the 



170 Sedition Lair. 

utmost caution in every word and action that are 
to come from the Executive, I mean if 3'our 
object is to avoid hostilities. Had this truth been 
understood before the recall of Monroe — before 
the coming or second coming of Pickney; had 
it guided the pens that wrote the bullying speech 
of 3"our president and the stupid answer of 3^our 
Senate at the opening of Congress in November 
last, I should probably have had no occasion to 
address you this letter. But when we found him 
borrowing: the language of Kdward Burke, and 
telling the whole world, that although he should 
succeed in treating with the French, there was no 
dependence to be j^laced in au}^ of their engage- 
ments, that their religion and morality were at an 
end, and they had turned pirates and plunderers, 
and that it would be necessary .to be perpetually 
armed against them, though they are at peace, we 
wonder that the answer of both Houses had not 
been to send hiin to the mad house. Instead of 
this, the Senate have echoed the speech with 
more servility than ever George the Third 
experienced from either House of Parliament." 

This arraignment of Adam's was probably 
drawn out by this allusion to France in his first 
annual message: "The state of society has so long 
been disturbed, the sense of moral and religious 
obligations so much weakened, public faith and 
national honor have been so impaired, respect 
to treaties has been so diminished, and the law 
of nations has lost so much of its force, while 



Sedition Lfar. 171 

pride, ambition, avarice, and violence, have been 
wo long unrestrained, there remains no reasonable 
.i^rorind on which to raise an expectation that a 
commerce without protection or defence will not 
be plundered." 

The law which made Lyon's publication 
criminal and subjected him to heavj^ fine and 
imprisonment not to exceed two jxars was well 
calculated to stir society to its verv depths, and 
having- soon expired bj^ limitation, too universal- 
1}^ odious to encourage an^^ attempt at re- 
newal. 

The committee, that reported the bill to 
refund the fine, expressed the opinion that the 
law Avas unconstitutional and void, and remarked: 
"No question connected with the liberty of the 
press ever excited a more universal, and intense 
interest, ever received so acute, able, long con- 
tinued and elaborate investigaton, was ever more 
generally understood, or. so conclusively settled by 
the concurring opinions of all parties, after the 
heated political contests of the da}" had passed 
away." While the excitment caused by the vSedi- 
tion law was so bitter at the time of, and follow- 
ing its enactment, the inflamed heads of its oppo- 
nents inveiged against it with no cool and mea- 
sured words and were susceptible of interpreta- 
tions which the authors themselves, probablj^ did 
not intend. 

The speech of Livingston gave utterance to 
the public indignation as represented hj the 



172 Resolutions of 1798-99. 

leading- democrats of the da}^ and \Ya.s succeeded 
by the memorable Kentucky and Virginia res- 
olutions of 1798-99. These, ever since their 
adoption, have been subjects of controversy and 
adverse interpretation and have been extensiveh^ 
invoked as countenancing nullification and seces- 
sion and have been svibjected to severe criticism. 
They afterwards received exposition from some 
of those who were foremost in giving them cur- 
rency. The opinions of Livington were devel- 
oped in Jackson's celebrated porclamation against 
South Carolina nullification in 1832, of which, as 
Secretary of State he drew up the original draft. 

Madison, in a letter to Edward Everett, in 
1830, says: In the event of a failure of ever^^ 
constitutional resort and an accumulation of 
usurpations and abuses rendering non-resistance, a 
greater evil than resistance and revolution, there 
can remain but one resort, — the last of all — an 
appeal from the canceled obligations of the Con- 
stitutional compact to original right and the laws 
of self preservation. This is the ultima ratio of 
all governments, whether consolidated, confeder- 
ated or a compound of both." 

Mr. Webster, whose opinions were formed by 
an intellect trained to the work of discussing 
great political questions, weighing evidence and 
determining its relevanc}^ and importance in his, 
debate with Haj^ne said; "I wish now vSir, to make 
a remark upon the Virginia resolution of 1798. I 
cannot undertake to say how these resolutions were 



Resolutions of 1798-90. 173 

niiderstood by those who passed them. Their langu- 
age is not a little indefinite. In the case of the ex- 
ercise by Congress of dangerous power not grant- 
ed to them, the resolutions assert the right on the 
part of the State, to interfere and arrest the pro- 
gress of the evil. Tisis is susceptible of more 
than one interpretation. It may mean that states 
may interfere hj complaint and remonstrance or 
by proposing to the people an alteration of tlie 
Federal Constitution. This would all be quite un- 
objectionable; or it may be, that no more is meant 
than to assert the general right of revolution as 
against all governements, in cases of intolerable 
oppression. This no one doubts, and this, in my 
opinion, is all that he who framed the resolutions 
could have meant b}'- it, for I shall not readily be- 
lieve that he was ever of the opinion that a state 
under the constitution and in conformity with it, 
could, upon the ground of its own opinion of its 
unconstitutionality, however clear and palpable she 
might think the case, annul a law of Congress so 
far as it should operate upon herself, by her own 
legislative power." 

The current of poptxlar opinion finall}^ set 
strongly against Adams. The Alien and vSedition 
laws had excited a storm of abuse; his negotia- 
tions with France had caused great dissatisfac- 
tion in his own party, and the sj^mpathies ascrib- 
ed to him of favoring English interests against 
republican France, however groundless, operated 
greatly to his prejudice and all contributed to his 



174 Jefferson Elected President. 

defeat at the Presidential election of 1^00, when 
Jefferson was elected by a majority of eight elec- 
toral votes. At this election New England gave 
her vote for Adams, Init the republican party 
made such advance that in 1805, when Pickney 
was the Federal candidate, Jefferson received the 
vote of all New England except Connecticut. 

The administration of Jefferson during his 
first term conduced largely to his popularity. 
The general tone of his annual messages had been 
moderate and conciliatory. In alluding in his 
first message in December, 1801, to the tranquilli- 
ty of European States, he said: 

"While we devoutl}" return thanks to the ben- 
eficent Being who has been pleased to breathe 
into them the spirit of conciliation and forgive- 
ness, we are bound with peculiar gratitude to be 
thankful to Him that our own peace has been pre- 
served, through a perilous season, and ourselves 
permitted to cultivate the earth and to practice 
and improve those arts which tend to increase 
our comforts." 

The quiet which pervaded the United States 
was soon interrupted by the extreme agitation, 
which was aroused in the western states in 1802, 
by the refusal of vSpain to allow New Orleans to 
be longer used as a place of deposit for western 
commerce. This was still further increased 
when it was learned that Spain had ceded Louisi- 
ana to France. The country bordering upon the 
Missippi river and its tributaries, was siezed with 



L^nisianR Purchase. 175 

a fever of excitement and Congress was inundat- 
ed with petitions upon the subject. Jefferson ini- 
mediatel}^ took steps to secure by treaty with 
France, the coveted territorj^ for deposit, but the 
American envo3^s, owing to the critical relations 
and impending war between France and England, 
the want of money and political considerations 
found Napolean, the first consul, anxious to sell 
the territory to the United vStates. This jjroj^osi- 
tion, so unexpected and beyond their anticipa- 
tions and promising such grand results to their 
countr3^, filled them with surprise and gratifica- 
tion and the^'' at once concluded a treaty transfer- 
ring Louisiana to the United States subject to the 
approval of the American vSenate, which was 
given on the 20tli of October, 1803, by a vote of 24 
to 7. The House by a vote of 90 to 25 decided to 
carry the treats" into effect and made the necessa- 
ry appropriation for that purpose. The opposi- 
tion to the treaty came from federalists. It was 
contended that the domain of the United vStates 
was already sufficiently extensive for one repub- 
lican government, that the acquisition of more 
territory was unconstitutional and would prove a 
had i^recedent in the future, and although the 
strongest opposition came from New England, 
yet four out of her six states voted for Jefferson's 
re-election. 

vScarcely was the treaty concluded before 
France and England were engaged in war which 
they prosecuted regardless of American mari- 
time and commercial rights. Jefferson, unwilling 



176 Jefferson's Gun Boat 

to bs involved in war, or to become embroiled in 
European entang;leni3nts, resorted to negotiations 
abroad, but with the concvirrence of Congress 
adopted measures of protection at home wiiich 
were perhaps of dovibtful utility. In repl}^ to a 
request of the House of Representatives for in- 
formation as to the effect of gun boats in the 
protection and defense of harbors, he returned a 
special message February lOth, 1807, in which he 
discusses the objects aimed at and the number 
desired, refers to the opinions of land and naval 
officers who had been consulted and closes by 
saying *'it must be superfluous to observe that 
this species of naval armament is proposed 
merel}" for naval operations, that it can have 
little effect toward protecting our commerce in 
the open seas, even on our coast; and still less 
can it become an incitment to engage in offensive 
maritime war toward which it would ftirnish no 
means." 

His gun boat system however was seized 
upon by his political opponents with avidity as 
an object of ridicule and a fruitful source of ex- 
travagence. 

His envoj^s to Great Britain to procure a 
treat}^ for the security of American rights effected 
one which failing to prevent the impressment of 
American seamen and falling short of the 
president's wishes he with held it from the sen- 
ate and instructed the envoys to renew their 
efforts for more satisfactory arrangements. 



Embargo, 177 

Not suceeding in this, the president was severel}^ 
censured by his opponents for with-holding it 
from the vSenate as it contained, they said, pro- 
visions favorable to commerce. The republican 
party however sustained his action as being fully 
within his constitutional powers. 

American commerce and seamen were sub- 
jected to such outrage in ever^^ quarter of the globe 
as to induce congress to pass a law in Dec. 1807, 
knowai as the Embargo Act, which prohibited 
American vessels from sailing for foreign ports, 
all foreign vessels from taking out cargoes, and 
all coasting vessels w^ere required to land their 
cargoes within the United States. This law 
passed the House by a vote of 82 to 44 and the 
vSenate 22 to 6. 

Jeiferson said "the effect of the law had been 
to save our mariners and our vast mercantile 
property, as well as affording time for prosecut- 
ing the defensive and provisional measures called 
for by the occasion." 

The embargo was denounced by the Federal 
party and, perhaps, no where more violently than 
in New England. Jefferson was accused of pro- 
curing it in the interest of France as it would 
disastrously affect, the manufacturing industries 
of Great Britain that, unlimited in duration in- 
stead of regulating commerce, as authorized by 
the Constitution it destroyed it, and that if intended 
as a measure of safety, those who were willing to 
assume the risks were the best judges of the 



J 7S Em bar go. 

dangers which they incurred. vShipwS, \i was 
said, remained idle and went to decay in their 
harbors, products of the soil or of mechanical 
industry accumulated and depreciated in value for 
the want of a market, evasion of law and a 
clandestine commerce w^eakened the tone of 
public morals, dulled the moral susceptibilities 
of courts and jurors; and politicians, with all the 
ingenuity and eloquence at their command, drew 
fanciful pictures of the public distress and 
drowned the voice of reason and the promptings 
of patriotism by appeals to excited passions and 
party interest. Although the extent of the 
disaffection in New England may have been 
exaggerated, and especially in Massachusetts 
where it doubtless attained the greatest propor- 
tions, it was sufficiently great to excite apprehen- 
sion in the bosoms of Jefferson and his political 
friends and they were induced to modify it by a 
non-intercourse law which removed the Embargo 
from the whole world but the two belligerents, 
and from them upon certain conditions. The 
elder Adams approved of the Embargo and his son 
favoring that measure, as well as some other acts 
of the Administration, so offended his old friends 
who had placed him in the United States vSenate 
that he resigned that position in 1808 and in 1809 
was appointed hy the president minister to vSt. 
Petersburg. In November of the latter year he 
confidentially informed Mr. Giles, one of the 
prominent sui^porters of the administration, of 
the embittered feeling which the Embargo 



JBnihargo. 179 

had enkindled in Massachussetts, that the peo- 
ple were constantly instigated to forcibly resist 
it, that juries after juries would acquit, regard- 
less of the decision of courts, upjn the ground 
of its unconstitutionality; that a separation of the 
Union was openl}^ stimulated in the public 
prints, that a convention of delegates of the New 
England vStates was proposed to be held at New 
Haven; that the objects of the leaders of the 
Federal party had been for several 3-ears a dis- 
olution of the Union and the establishment of a 
separate confederacy; and that, if civil war 
ensued, they would secure the aid of Great Bri- 
tain. These facts, he claimed, he knew from 
unequivocal evidence, although not proveable in 
a court of law. In imparting his information he 
took occasion to assure Mr. Giles that he had 
no personal or interested motive for his sup- 
port of Mr. Jefferson's administration and had no 
favor to ask of him whatever! The information 
thus communicated as to Eastern disaffection 
reached Mr. Jefferson and j^robabl^^ had great 
influence in procuring a modification of the Em- 
bargo, as it also undoubtedly had the effect of 
strengthening, if not to a considerable extent creat- 
ing, the impression which seized upon the public 
mind outside of New England, that she was the 
hot bed of traitors and over-run with treason. 
From disclosures in 1828, it would seem that 
federalism and the loj^ality of New England was 
receiving its severest blows, without suspecting 
their source from one who had enjo3^ed their 



180 Gov. Chittenden and the War. 

confidence and whose father had been honored by 
their unanimous support. 

In 1808, James Madison, the trusted friend of 
Jefferson, was elected president, receiving one 
hundred and twenty two electoral votes, including 
the six of Vermont while his federal competitor 
received only forty-seven of which Massachusetts, 
Connecticut, Rhode Island and New Hampshire 
gave thirty-nine. It was a period of gloom and 
despondency in those States, and a committee of 
the legislature of Massachusetts, in January 1809, 
thus depicted it. 

*'Our agriculture is discouraged. The fish- 
eries abandoned. Navigation forbidden. Our 
commerce at home restrained, if not annihilated. 
Our commerce abroad cut off. Our navy sold, 
dismantled, or degraded to the service of cutters 
or gunboats. The revenue extinguished. The 
course of justice interrupted, and the nation 
weakened by internal animosities and divisions, 
at the moment when it is unnecessarily and in- 
providently exposed to war with Great Britain, 
France and Spain." 

At a time of commercial distress so alarming 
according to the testimony of his political adver- 
saries, and of party animosity at its highest 
pitch, Madison entered upon his presidential 
duties embarrassed abroad by the arrogant con- 
duct of England and France, and at home, by the 
vituperations and attacks of political opponents 
and sometimes by the disapproval of friends. 



Gor, Strong and the War. 181 

Decidedly a man of peace, he fully realized the 
responsibility that rested upon him in the event 
of war, and the procrastination caused by the 
negotiations to avert it, irritated some of his own 
party while his opponents tauntingly proclaimed 
that "he could not be kicked into a war." His 
revilers, however, were destined to be undeceived 
and with peaceful measures and patience ex- 
hausted, war was finally declared against Great 
Britain June 18th, 1812. Anterior to this as well 
as during the war. New England continued to 
be convulsed with party strife, first one party 
then the other securing the ascendency. 

Elbridge Gerry, a revolutionary patriot, and 
afterward vice president of the United States, 
was elected governor of Massachusetts by the re- 
publicans in 1810, and in 1811, with both branches 
of the legislature on the same side. The next 
year he was suceeded by Caleb Strong, federalist, 
with the house of representatives of the same 
party. 

In his message, while adverting to the con- 
dition of the country, he said; if those measures 
are thought to be unjust or particularly injurious 
to this part of the Union let us cherish a confi- 
dence in the wisdom and justice of the other 
states and wait with patience for the remedy pro- 
vided by the constitution." 

The federalists obtained control of Vermont 
electing Martin Chittenden governor in 1813 and 
1814. 



182 American Victories. 

A controversy arose between those govern- 
ors and the president as to the constitutional 
rights of the latter to order detachments of the 
state militia to be marched into other states and 
placed under United vStates officers, insisting that 
the executives of the several states had the 
power to determine if the exigency under the 
constitution of the United vStates had arisen so as 
to require the state militia or an}^ part of it to be 
placed in the service of the United vStates at the 
request of the president. The judges of the 
Supreme Court of the state sustained this view 
of the subject, but in 1827, after the subsidence of 
part}^ spirit, the Supreme Court of the United 
vStates unaniinously rejected it. 

The governors of Massachusetts and Connec- 
ticut, acting under their own convictions, refused 
to obey the president's requisition for the militia 
to defend the maritime frontier. 

When Congress convened the correspondence 
of the refusing govenors was laid, by the president, 
before that bod}^ and in his message he condemed 
their action as founded on a novel and imfortu- 
nate exposition of the constitution and against 
the example of Washington in 1794, when he 
placed the militia of several states called out to 
suppress insurrection, under a governor of 
Virginia during his own absence. 

Chittenden, the governor of Vermont, was 
also inflexibl}' opposed to the militia going out of 
the state, except in a contingenc}" provided for b}- 



Madison. 183 

the constitution and a body of them having vol- 
untarily placed themselves under the command of 
a United States officer, at Plattsburg, New York, 
he issued a proclamation ordering them to return 
and expressing his extreme regret at their move- 
ment for "the defence of a sister state, fully com- 
petent to all the purposes of self defence, leaving 
the Vermont frontier in a measure unprotected 
and exposed to the ravages of an exasperated en- 
emy." 

This proclamation filled the militia with in- 
dignation, his messenger, who conveyed it, was 
summarily expelled from camp, and the officers 
made a reply asserting that they were in the 
actual service of their country; that if legally 
ordered into that service he had no authority to 
order them out, and that if illegally ordered into 
it, their continuance was either voluntary or com- 
pulsory, and if the latter they had their redress 
by an appeal to the laws of their country; that in 
either case he had no right to interfere, and that 
an invitation or order to desert the standard of 
their countrj^ would not be obeyed by them, al- 
though proceeding from the governor and cap- 
tain general of Vermont. Indignation was not 
confined to the camp, and Mr. Sharp, of Ken- 
tucky, at the following session of Congress, intro- 
duced resolutions looking to a criminal prosecu- 
tion of the governor of Vermont for enticing 
soldiers, by his proclamation, to desert the ser- 
vice of the United States. The delegation of the 



184 Madison. 

latter state was republican and objected to the 
resolutions; Mr. Fisk, one of the number, stating; 
that he belived few people in his state approved 
of the proclamation and that he was certain the 
delescation from the state condemned it. The 
resolutions were laid on the table and not called 
up. 

However great the obloquy incurred by the 
governor from his historic proclamation, he soon 
had an opportunity to evince his loyalty to his 
own state and his alacrit}^ to repel a large British 
force invading New York, Receiving information 
in April from the United States officers at Platts- 
burg, of a probable immediate attack upon the 
vessels of Macdonought's fleet then at the mouth 
of Otter Creek, in Vermont, and others then on 
the stocks, he promptly ordered out fifteen 
hundred of the militia for their protection and to 
remain as long as necessar^^ for that purpose. 
When an attack was made on the first of the fol- 
lowing month the militia in the vicinit}^ partici- 
pated in the gallant repulse of the enem3^ The 
fleet, in vSeptember, achieved a splendid and 
memorable victory on Lake Champlain, accom- 
panied by the disastrous defeat at Plattsburg, of 
the British army under General Provost. 

This signal land victory was achieved with 
the aid of twenty -five hundred Vermont volun- 
ters under General Strong, called to the service 
by the govornor, in the absence of a requisition 
from the president, upon the application of Gen- 



American Victories. 185 

eral Macomb for assistance. These victories were 
followed bj^ great rejoicing throughout the state. 

The governor, in his message to the legisla- 
ture in October, congratulated them upon the 
grand results "so glorious to the American arms, 
and reflecting the highest honor upon the patriot- 
ism, spirit and valor of our fellow citizens, who 
without distinction of age,character or partj^ were 
ready to brave danger in its most formidable ap- 
pearance for the defence of their countrj^" 

He also bestowed the highest encomiums 
upon Strong, Macdonough and Macomb. 
Amid the general exultation over the victories he 
could not abstain from saying: "But I consider 
it due to myself, and more especiallj^ to my con- 
stituents, explicitl3^ to state that the events of the 
war have in no wise altered my opinion of its 
origin or its progress. I have conscientiously 
and uniformilj^ disapproved of it as unnecessary, 
unwise and hopeless in all its offensive opera- 
tions." 

A committee representing the state of New 
York presented a sword to General vStrong having 
on the scabbard this inscription: — "Presented b)^ 
his Excellency, Daniel D. Tompkins, Governor of 
the State of New York, pursuant to a resolution 
of the vSenate and Assembly of said State, to Ma- 
jor General Samuel Strong, of the Vermont volun- 
teers, as a memorial of the sense entertained by 
the State of his services, and those of his brave 
mountaineers at the battle at Plattsburg." 



186 Gov. Chittenden and the War. 

Hon. E. P. Walton,* the editor of that vahia- 
ble work, the Records of the Governors and 
Council of Vermont, with pradonable state pride 
thus avers to the ardor and patriotism of the peo- 
ple of the state as follows: 

"Scrupulous as to his right to order the mili- 
tia out of the vState, to be commanded by a United 
vStates officer, Gov. Chittenden had called for 
volunteers. This call w^as at once responded to, 
not only in the western counties, nearest the 
scene of battle, w^iose men arrived in time to 
take part, but also in central and eastern Vermont. 
Irrespective of party spirit or age, the people 
turned out en masse, fathers and sons, veterans 
of the revolution, and lads too young for militar}- 
service, and all pressed on toward the Lake. 
Had Provost carried Plattsburg and undertaken 
to w^inter at Ticonderoga, the Vermonters alone 
would have penned in his arni}^ and forced it by 
starvation to surrender." 

The message of 1814 was the last which the 
sturd}^ independent and conscientious govenor 
Martin Chittenden had an opportunity to make. 
Vermont at the next election Avheeled back into 
the rebublican line and the federal party in the 
state, in a few 3'ears, dissappeared as a party 
organization. 

As much as the people of New England had 
been divided and convulsed upon peace and war 

'^Formerly member of Congress. 



Hartford Convention. 187 

measures, and other political questions, fresh 
fuel was added to an exicited party spirit by the 
initiation, in 1814, of the memorable Hartford 
convention. 

In his message, in October, of that year, gov- 
enor Strong, of Massachusetts, called the atten- 
tion of the state legislature to the exposed con- 
dition of the state to hostile attacks and to the 
deppressed condition of coinnierce. The com- 
mittee to whom the subject was referred, through 
the Hon. H. G. Otis, submitted a report with 
several resolutions, one in favor of the volunteer 
enlistment of ten thousand men for twelve 
months or during the war, to be organized with 
officers appointed by the govenor for the defence 
of the state; one for appointing delegates to a 
convention with an invitation to the other New 
Bngland states to participate and consult upon 
the public grievances and the best means of 
defence, and also upon measures to procure a 
convention of delegates from all the states in 
order to revise the constitution thereof and more 
effectually to secure the support and attachment 
of all the people by placing all upon the basis of 
fair representation. 

The resolutions were adopted, but thirteen 
Senators and seventy-six members of the House 
filed protests against the action of the majority. 
Invitations were accepted by Rhode Island and 
Connecticut but not by New Hampshire and Ver- 
mont. In the former state there was no opportu- 



188 Hartford Convention, 

nity for the legislature to act upon it, the council 
being republican, refusing to convene for that 
object. It was considered, however, b}^ the 
legislature of Vermont, which was strongly feder- 
al. A Council of twelve members constituted one 
branch of the legislature but some years afterward 
was superceded b^^ a state senate. 

When the invitation of Massachusetts was 
submitted b}^ Governor Chittenden, it was referred 
to a joint committee of three on the part of the 
Council, and six on the part of the House, those of 
the Council being Wm. Hall, Jr., Nicholas Baj^lies 
and John W. Chandler; those of the House 
Nathaniel Niles. Chaunce}^ Langdon, Henry Olin, 
Asa Lyon, John Philips and David Edmond; of 
these, six were federalists and three republi- 
cans. 

The committee unanimously reported against 
appearing or participating in the convention and 
both branches with unanimity concurred in the 
report. 

The convention convened at Hartford, 
Connecticut, closing their proceedings early in 
January, 1815, having carried them on under a 
cloak of impenetrable secrecy, recommending 
that Congress should be asked to permit the 
states separatel}^ or in concert to assume the 
defence of their territory against the enemy and 
the application of a reasonable portion of the 
taxes collected within them to that purpose; 
that several amendments should be made to the 



Hartford Convention. 189 

National Constitution to apportion representation 
and direct taxes according to the number of free 
persons; and providing that no new state should 
be admitted, no Embargo laid for more than sixty 
da^^s, that no interdiction of commerce between 
the United States and foreign governments 
should be permitted, that no declaration of war 
should be made, nor authorization of acts of 
hostilit}^ against au}'^ foreign nations except such 
acts should be in defence of the territories of the 
United vStates, without the concurrence of two- 
thirds of both branches of Congress, also that no 
person thereafter naturalized should be eligible to 
any civil office under the authority of the United 
vStates, and that no person should be elected pres- 
ident for the second term. 

If an application to Congress proved unsuc- 
cessful, peace not concluded and the defence of 
the New England states neglected as had been 
done, the3^ assert, from the commencement of 
the war, the^^ express the opinion that it would be 
expedient for the states to send delegates to a con- 
vention to be held in Boston in the following June 
to considt, and act as the crisis should require. 
The legislature of Massachusetts apj) roved the 
report and appointed delegates to proceed to 
Washington, Connecticut taking similar action. 

The secrec}^ which enshrouded the conven- 
tion, and which was not removed from its Journal 
for several 5"ears, gave loose rein to rumor with 
her hundred tongues and to the imputations of 



too Hartford Convention. 

exasperated political foes. Aroused at last by 
the continual representation of treasonable de- 
signs, Otis and other leading federalists of Massa- 
chusetts declared that "the main object of the 
convention was the defence of this part of the 
country against the common enem3^" That pro- 
ceedings and report of the convention was in 
conforniit}^ with this object, that the convention 
adjourned early in Jan^ar>^ 1815, and that on the 
twenty-seventh of the same month Congress 
passed an act which gave the state the power 
sought by Massachusetts, viz. that of "raising^ 
organizing and officering state troops to be 
employed in the state raising the same or in an 
adjoining state, and providing for their pa}^ and 
subsistence." That, the}^ say, "was the most im- 
portant object aimed at by the institution of the 
convention, and by the report of that body. Had 
this act of Congress passed before the act of 
Massachusetts for organizing the convention, that 
convention would never have existed, and that 
they had never known nor suspected the party 
which prevailed in Massachusetts in 1808, or any 
other party in this state ever entertained the design 
to produce a dissolution of the Union or the estab- 
lishment of a separate confederation." 

The federal mission to Washington, was, how- 
ever, suddenly arrested as the tidings of Jackson's 
great victorj^ at New Orleans and of the treaty of 
peace swept over the land, welcomed every 
where by bonfires, illuminations, booming of can- 
non and general exultation, drowning the voice 



RD-94 



I^ra of Good Eeeling, 191 

of party strife and carrying to the federal part}^ 
the deep conviction of its complete and final over- 
throw. 

In Massachusetts, at the following election, 
the republicans carried the state, and the senate 
at once rescinded the unpatriotic resolution of a 
former federal senate, in the matter of the capture 
of a British frigate, which denounced the war as 
unjust and unecessar3^ 

The accession of the Republican Monroe to 
the presidency, in 1816, inspired confidence in the 
triumphant party that their victory was complete 
and enduring, and introduced an "era of gocd 
feeling," which subdued the asperites of former 
strife, and henceforth old political adversaries 
co-mingled in opposing or supporting piiblic men 
and measures as their individual sense of dut3' 
dictated. In after years many New England 
federalists of 1812, occupied high and responsible 
positions in public life, conspicuous among 
them being that eminent orator, jurist and states- 
man, Daniel Webster, of Massachusetts, and also 
vSamuel Prentiss of Vermont, who, for iw^nj j'^ears 
adorned the judiciary of his state by his legal 
ability, and then faithfully served for twelve years 
in the Senate of the United vStates with great credit 
to himself and satisfaction to his constitutents. 



GENEALOGY. 



Genealogy of a part of the Ripley Family, collected from a 
compilation by H.W. Ripley, Harlem, N. Y. Published in 1867. 
FIRST GENERATION: 
William Ripley, of West Bridgewater, Massachusetts. 

SECOND GENERATION: 
Margaret, Sarah (b. 1696. m. Geo. Bryant) John, Martha(m. 
John Ravvson) William, Samuel. 

"Johnathan (b. Mar. 5, 1707, d. Aug. 10, 1772) Timothy, 
Christopher. 

THIRD GENERATION: 
Johnathan m. Hannah Sturtevant, of Halifax, Mass. 

children: 
Abigail, ra. Ames, Rebecca, Perez, Johnathan, Abner, (m. 
Elizabeth White) Hannah. 

"Sylvanus. (b. Sept. 29 1749, d. Feb. 5. 1787.) 

FOURTH GENERATION: 

Sylvanus, Rev. (m. Abigail, daughter of Eleazer Wheelock, 
Pres. Dart. Coll. who died April 9, 18 18.) 

CHILDREN: 

John Philips, [d. Mar. 7, 1816, aged 40 years.] 

Mary, [b, Nov. 4. 1778. m, Nicholas Baylies, Judge of the 
Supreme Court, Montpelier, Vt. d. Feb. 6, 1830.] 

Abigail, m. Dr. Eliphalet Eyman, of Woodstock, Conn. 

Eleazer Wheelock, Maj. Gen U. S. A. and M. C. [b. April 
15, 1781, d. March 2 1739.] 

Elizabeth, [b. 1784 m. Hon. Judah Dana, U. S. Senator, 
Fryeburg, Mane.] 

James Wheelock [b. March 12, 1786, d. June 2 1835.] 



r^^^'-j!" %.'f-r-\^ ^^^'^iW-'J' '^o'-.f 



''**0^ 










'/^■^-^ ^»- /\ '•^•' .^'% "• 









^^..^^ /Jfe--. %/ .•^^", %,^* •'' 





' ■•^<- %.,,^ .-^-^ %/ ,-^^..%, 



o V 



^^•n^^ V 









^ 
















-^-^ co^c:^;^^ '^^o .-^*' .-i^^^^ V " 







r . 







•^C 






"'^..'i^ 



i_r> <;■ 



'^..^^ 




.** /^fe-. \„,/ .*^&- '*'* ** -^Hfes'- -?- -^^ ♦■ 

O. 'o , » * 

'* - - - V 






r. AUGUSTINE . „^ '^^ <^ ^ . . . •^ f ^ , . „^ "^ ^ 



